"Sleep, weary ones, while ye may --
            Sleep, oh, sleep!"
                    Eugene Field.


        Thro' May time blossoms, with whisper low,
        The soft wind sang to the dead below:
        "Think not with regret on the Springtime's song
        And the task ye left while your hands were strong.
        The song would have ceased when the Spring was past,
        And the task that was joyous be weary at last."

        To the winter sky when the nights were long
        The tree-tops tossed with a ceaseless song:
        "Do ye think with regret on the sunny days
        And the path ye left, with its untrod ways?
        The sun might sink in a storm cloud's frown
        And the path grow rough when the night came down."...

The babe is at peace within the womb;
The corpse is at rest within the tomb:
We begin in what we end.

How beautiful a new sun is when it rises,
flashing out its greeting, like an explosion!
Happy, whoever hails with sweet emotion
its descent, nobler than a dream, to our eyes!


I remember! I’ve seen all, flower, furrow, fountain,
swoon beneath its look, like a throbbing heart
Let’s run quickly, it’s late, towards the horizon,
to catch at least one slanting ray as it departs!


But I pursue the vanishing God in vain:
irresistible Night establishes its sway,
full of shudders, black, dismal, cold:


an odour of the tomb floats in the shadow,
at the swamp’s edge, feet faltering I go,
bruising damp slugs, and unexpected toads.

Even the bravest that are slain
Shall not dissemble their surprise
On waking to find valor reign,
Even as on earth, in paradise;
And where they sought without the sword
Wide fields of asphodel fore'er,
To find that the utmost reward
Of daring should be still to dare.

The light of heaven falls whole and white
And is not shattered into dyes,
The light forever is morning light;
The hills are verdured pasture-wise;
The angle hosts with freshness go,
And seek with laughter what to brave;
And binding all is the hushed snow
Of the far-distant breaking wave.

And from a cliff-top is proclaimed
The gathering of the souls for birth,
The trial by existence named,
The obscuration upon earth.
And the slant spirits trooping by
In streams ...

We stood in the shrill electric light,
Dumb and sick in the whirling din
We who had all of love to say
And a single second to say it in.

"Good-by!" "Good-by!" you turned to go,
I felt the train's slow heavy start,
You thought to see me cry, but oh
My tears were hidden in my heart.

I

Beneath the concave of an April sky,
When all the fields with freshest green were dight,
Appeared, in presence of the spiritual eye
That aids or supersedes our grosser sight,
The form and rich habiliments of One
Whose countenance bore resemblance to the sun,
When it reveals, in evening majesty,
Features half lost amid their own pure light.
Poised like a weary cloud, in middle air
He hung, then floated with angelic ease
(Softening that bright effulgence by degrees)
Till he had reached a summit sharp and bare,
Where oft the venturous heifer drinks the noontide breeze.
Upon the apex of that lofty cone
Alighted, there the Stranger stood alone;
Fair as a gorgeous Fabric of the east
Suddenly raised by some enchanter's power,
Where nothing was; and ...

Lift up your heads: in life, in death,
God knoweth his head was high.
Quit we the coward's broken breath
Who watched a strong man die.

If we must say, 'No more his peer
Cometh; the flag is furled.'
Stand not too near him, lest he hear
That slander on the world.

The good green earth he loved and trod
Is still, with many a scar,
Writ in the chronicles of God,
A giant-bearing star.

He fell: but Britain's banner swings
Above his sunken crown.
Black death shall have his toll of kings
Before that cross goes down.

Once more shall move with mighty things
His house of ancient tale,
Where kings whose hands were kissed of kings
Went in: and came out pale.

O young ones of a darker day,
In art's wan colours clad,
...

I

The moving sun-shapes on the spray,
The sparkles where the brook was flowing,
Pink faces, plightings, moonlit May,
These were the things we wished would stay;
But they were going.

II

Seasons of blankness as of snow,
The silent bleed of a world decaying,
The moan of multitudes in woe,
These were the things we wished would go;
But they were staying.

III

Then we looked closelier at Time,
And saw his ghostly arms revolving
To sweep off woeful things with prime,
Things sinister with things sublime
Alike dissolving.

'Where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.'


The time-gun rolls his nerve-destroying bray;
The toiling moon rides slowly o'er the trees;
The weary diners cast their cares away,
And seek the lawn for coolness and for ease.

Now spreads the gathering stillness like a pall,
And melancholy silence rules the scene,
Save where the bugler sounds his homing call,
And thirsty THOMAS leaves the wet canteen;

Save that from yonder lines in deepest gloom
Th' ambiguous mule does of the stick[1] bewail,
Whose dunder craft forbids him to consume
His proper blanket, or his neighbour's tail.

Beneath those jagged tiles, that low-built roof
(Whose inmost secret deeps let none divine!),
Each to his master's cry supremely proof,<...

Why comes not Francis? From the doleful City
He fled, and, in his flight, could hear
The death-sounds of the Minster-bell:
That sullen stroke pronounced farewell
To Marmaduke, cut off from pity!
To Ambrose that! and then a knell
For him, the sweet half-opened Flower!
For all all dying in one hour!
Why comes not Francis? Thoughts of love
Should bear him to his Sister dear
With the fleet motion of a dove;
Yea, like a heavenly messenger
Of speediest wing, should he appear.
Why comes he not? for westward fast
Along the plain of York he past;
Reckless of what impels or leads,
Unchecked he hurries on; nor heeds
The sorrow, through the Villages,
Spread by triumphant cruelties
Of vengeful military force,
And punishment without remorse.
He mark...

'Twixt a smile and a tear,
'Twixt a song and a sigh,
'Twixt the day and the dark,
When the night draweth nigh.

Ah, sunshine may fade
From the heavens above,
No twilight have we
To the day of our love.

New flowery scents strewed everywhere,
New sunshine poured in largesse fair,
"We shall be happy now," we say.
A voice just trembles through the air,
And whispers, "May."

Nay, but we MUST! No tiny bud
But thrills with rapture at the flood
Of fresh young life which stirs to-day.
The same wild thrill irradiates our blood;
Why hint of "May"?

For us are coming fast and soon
The delicate witcheries of June;
July, with ankles deep in hay;
The bounteous Autumn. Like a mocking tune
Again sounds, "May."

Spring's last-born darling, clear-eyed, sweet,
Pauses a moment, with white twinkling feet,
And golden locks in breezy play,
Half teasing and half tender, to repeat
Her song of "May."

Ah, month of hope! all promised glee,
A...

How often we forget all time, when lone
Admiring Nature's universal throne;
Her woods, her wilds, her mountains, the intense
Reply of Hers to Our intelligence! [BYRON, The Island.]

I

In youth have I known one with whom the Earth
In secret communing held, as he with it,
In daylight, and in beauty from his birth:
Whose fervid, flickering torch of life was lit
From the sun and stars, whence he had drawn forth
A passionate light, such for his spirit was fit,
And yet that spirit knew not, in the hour
Of its own fervor what had o'er it power.


II

Perhaps it may be that my mind is wrought
To a fever by the moonbeam that hangs o'er,
But I will half believe that wild light fraught
With more of sovereignty than ancient lore
Hath ev...

Above her, pearl and rose the heavens lay;
Around her, flowers scattered earth with gold,
Or down the path in insolence held sway--
Like cavaliers who ride the elves' highway--
Scarlet and blue, within a garden old.

Beyond the hills, faint-heard through belts of wood,
Bells, Sabbath-sweet, swooned from some far-off town;
Gamboge and gold, broad sunset colors strewed
The purple west as if, with God imbued,
Her mighty pallet Nature there laid down.

Amid such flowers, underneath such skies,
Embodying all life knows of sweet and fair,
She stood; love's dreams in girlhood's face and eyes,
White as a star that comes to emphasize
The mingled beauty of the earth and air.

Behind her, seen through vines and orchard trees,
Gray with its twinkling window...

To die be given us, or attain!
Fierce work it were, to do again.
So pilgrims, bound for Mecca, pray’d
At burning noon: so warriors said,
Scarf’d with the cross, who watch’d the miles
Of dust that wreath’d their struggling files
Down Lydian mountains: so, when snows
Round Alpine summits eddying rose,
The Goth, bound Rome-wards: so the Hun,
Crouch’d on his saddle, when the sun
Went lurid down o’er flooded plains
Through which the groaning Danube strains
To the drear Euxine: so pray all,
Whom labours, self-ordain’d, enthrall;
Because they to themselves propose
On this side the all-common close
A goal which, gain’d, may give repose.
So pray they: and to stand again
Where they stood once, to them were pain;
Pain to thread back and to renew
Past ...

All things within this fading world hath end,
Adversity doth still our joys attend;
No ties so strong, no friends so dear and sweet,
But with death's parting blow is sure to meet.
The sentence past is most irrevocable,
A common thing, yet oh, inevitable.
How soon, my Dear, death may my steps attend.
How soon't may be thy lot to lose thy friend,
We both are ignorant, yet love bids me
These farewell lines to recommend to thee,
That when that knot's untied that made us one,
I may seem thine, who in effect am none.
And if I see not half my days that's due,
What nature would, God grant to yours and you;
The many faults that well you know
I have Let be interred in my oblivious grave;
If any worth or virtue were in me,
Let that live freshly in thy memory
An...

The threefold terror of love; a fallen flare
Through the hollow of an ear;
Wings beating about the room;
The terror of all terrors that I bore
The Heavens in my womb.
Had I not found content among the shows
Every common woman knows,
Chimney corner, garden walk,
Or rocky cistern where we tread the clothes
And gather all the talk?
What is this flesh I purchased with my pains,
This fallen star my milk sustains,
This love that makes my heart's blood stop
Or strikes a Sudden chill into my bones
And bids my hair stand up?

On this long storm the rainbow rose,
On this late morn the sun;
The clouds, like listless elephants,
Horizons straggled down.

The birds rose smiling in their nests,
The gales indeed were done;
Alas! how heedless were the eyes
On whom the summer shone!

The quiet nonchalance of death
No daybreak can bestir;
The slow archangel's syllables
Must awaken her.