Sometimes my idle heart would roam
    Far from its quiet happy nest,
To seek some other newer home,
    Some unaccustomed Best:
But ere it spreads its foolish wings,
'Heart, stay at home, be wise!' Love's wisdom sings.

Sometimes my idle heart would sail
    From out its quiet sheltered bay,
To tempt a less pacific gale,
    And oceans far away:
But ere it shakes its foolish wings,
'Heart, stay at home, be wise!' Love's wisdom sings.

Sometimes my idle heart would fly,
    Mothlike, to reach some shining sin,
It seems so sweet to burn and die
    That wondrous light within:
But ere it burns its foolish wings,
'Heart, stay at home, be wise!' Love's wisdom sings.

When the wind works against us in the dark,
And pelts with snow
The lowest chamber window on the east,
And whispers with a sort of stifled bark,
The beast,
'Come out! Come out!'
It costs no inward struggle not to go,
Ah, no!
I count our strength,
Two and a child,
Those of us not asleep subdued to mark
How the cold creeps as the fire dies at length,
How drifts are piled,
Dooryard and road ungraded,
Till even the comforting barn grows far away
And my heart owns a doubt
Whether 'tis in us to arise with day
And save ourselves unaided.

Let those who will stride on their barren roads
And prick themselves to haste with self-made goads,
Unheeding, as they struggle day by day,
If flowers be sweet or skies be blue or gray:
For me, the lone, cool way by purling brooks,
The solemn quiet of the woodland nooks,
A song-bird somewhere trilling sadly gay,
A pause to pick a flower beside the way.

O take this world away from me;
Its strife I cannot bear to see,
Its very praises hurt me more
Than een its coldness did before,
Its hollow ways torment me now
And start a cold sweat on my brow,
Its noise I cannot bear to hear,
Its joy is trouble to my ear,
Its ways I cannot bear to see,
Its crowds are solitudes to me.
O, how I long to be agen
That poor and independent man,
With labour's lot from morn to night
And books to read at candle light;
That followed labour in the field
From light to dark when toil could yield
Real happiness with little gain,
Rich thoughtless health unknown to pain:
Though, leaning on my spade to rest,
I've thought how richer folks were blest
And knew not quiet was the best.

Go with your tauntings, go;

Night's heavy hand is lifted up at last,
    And my freed heart beats evenly again,
    Unpress'd by that dull heavy weight of pain
Cast backward from the unforgotten Past;
    Darkness no longer muffles Time's slow tread,
    Till my own pulse-beat mark the moment fled.

Over the speeding shadows, calm and clear,
    Rises the Star of Morn upon the Earth,
    Eternal Prophet of the Sun-god's birth,
Shining serenely from its silver sphere
    Mute mystic meanings on the strengthen'd soul,
    Till all its night-bred vapours backward roll.

Oh, bright-eyed Angel of the undimm'd Light,
    Standing upon Heaven's pinnacle, thy glance
    Pierces like two-edged sword through many a trance,
Dividing Truth from Dreaming in its might,
    Scourging Doubt's ...

THOSE who in fables deal, bestow at ease
Both names and titles, freely as they please.
It costs them scarcely any thing, we find.
And each is nymph or shepherdess designed;
Some e'en are goddesses, that move below,
From whom celestial bliss of course must flow.

THIS Horace followed, with superior art: -
If, to the trav'ller's bed, with throbbing heart,
The chambermaid approached, 'twas Ilia found,
Or fair Egeria, or some nymph renowned.

GOD, in his goodness, made, one lovely day,
Apollo, who directs the lyrick lay,
And gave him pow'rs to call and name at will,
Like father Adam, with primordial skill.
Said he, go, names bestow that please the ear;
In ev'ry word let sweetest sound appear.
This ancient law then proves, by right divine,
WE oft are...

Oh earth, oh dewy mother, breathe on us
Something of all thy beauty and thy might,
Us that are part of day, but most of night,
Not strong like thee, but ever burdened thus
With glooms and cares, things pale and dolorous
Whose gladest moments are not wholly bright;
Something of all thy freshness and thy light,
Oh earth, oh mighty mother, breathe on us.

Oh mother, who wast long before our day,
And after us full many an age shalt be.
Careworn and blind, we wander from thy way:
Born of thy strength, yet weak and halt are we
Grant us, oh mother, therefore, us who pray,
Some little of thy light and majesty.

Since, for thy full deserts, with all the rest
Of these chaste spirits that are here possest
Of life eternal, time has made thee one
For growth in this my rich plantation,
Live here; but know 'twas virtue, and not chance,
That gave thee this so high inheritance.
Keep it for ever, grounded with the good,
Who hold fast here an endless livelihood.

    When from my fumbling hand the tired pen falls,
    And in the twilight weary droops my head;
    While to my quiet heart a still voice calls,
    Calls me to join my kindred of the Dead:
    Grant that I may, O Lord, ere rest be mine,
    Write to Thy praise one radiant, ringing line.

    For all of worth that in this clay abides,
    The leaping rapture and the ardent flame,
    The hope, the high resolve, the faith that guides:
    All, all is Thine, and liveth in Thy name:
    Lord, have I dallied with the sacred fire!
    Lord, have I trailed Thy glory in the mire!

    E'en as a toper from the dram-shop reeling,
    Sees in his garret's blackness, dazzling fair,
    All that he might have been, and, heart-sick, kneeling,
    Sobs in the passion...

I am the outer gate of life where sit
    Faith and Unfaith, those two interpreters
That spell in diverse ways what God has writ
    In symbols on the archway of the years.

Backward I swing for many feet to pass;
    Some come in stormy haste, some grave and slow,
And all like windy shadows on the grass:
    Beyond my pale I know not where they go.

My thoughts go back to last July,
Sweet happy thoughts and tender;
“The bridal of the earth and sky,”
A day of noble splendour;
A day to make the saddest heart
In joy a true believer;
When two good friends we roamed apart
The shady walks of Belvoir.

A maiden like a budding rose,
Unconscious of the golden
And fragrant bliss of love that glows
Deep in her heart infolden;
A Poet old in years and thought,
Yet not too old for pleasance,
Made young again and fancy-fraught
By such a sweet friend's presence.

The other two beyond our ken
Most shamefully deserted,
And far from all the ways of men
Their stealthy steps averted:
Of course our Jack would go astray,
Erotic and erratic;
But Mary! well, I own the day
Was really to...

A word of Godspeed and good cheer
To all on earth, or far or near,
Or friend or foe, or thine or mine -
In echo of the voice divine,
Heard when the star bloomed forth and lit
The world's face, with God's smile on it.

O city, look the Eastward way!
Beyond thy roofs of shadowy red and grey
Floats like a lily on the airy stream,
Radiant and vast, a cloud,
Around whose billowy head
Splendour from out the glooming West is shed
As if it were not ever to take flight,
And on its edge of gleam
In the clear blue of waning afternoon,
Faint as a spirit slipping from the shroud,
Faint, and yet gathering light,
The Moon.

O city, dream and pray!
This is thy evensong at close of day.

After the Christmas, with the help of Christ, I will never stop if I am alive; I will go to the sharp-edged little hill; for it is a fine place without fog falling; a blessed placethat    the sun shines on, and the wind doesn't rise there or anything of the sort.

And if you were a year there you would get no rest, only sitting up at night and forever drinking.The lamb and the sheep are there; the cow and the calf are there, fine lands are there without    heath and without bog. Ploughing & seed-sowing in the right month, plough and harrow prepared and ready; the rent that is called for there, they have means to pay it. There is oats and flax & large eared barley. There are beautiful    valleys with good growth in them and hay. Rods grow there, and bushes and tufts, white fields are there and respect for trees; shade and...

I.

My Sister! my sweet Sister! if a name
Dearer and purer were, it should be thine.
Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim
No tears, but tenderness to answer mine:
Go where I will, to me thou art the same -
A loved regret which I would not resign.[z]
There yet are two things in my destiny, -
A world to roam through, and a home with thee.[84]

II.

The first were nothing - had I still the last,
It were the haven of my happiness;
But other claims and other ties thou hast,[aa]
And mine is not the wish to make them less.
A strange doom is thy father's son's, and past[ab]
Recalling, as it lies beyond redress;
Reversed for him our grandsire's[85] fate of yore, -
He had no rest at sea, nor...

Come va 'l mondo! or mi diletta e piace.

HE BLESSES LAURA FOR HER VIRTUE.


    How goes the world! now please me and delight
What most displeased me: now I see and feel
My trials were vouchsafed me for my weal,
That peace eternal should brief war requite.
O hopes and wishes, ever fond and slight,
In lovers most, which oftener harm than heal!
Worse had she yielded to my warm appeal
Whom Heaven has welcomed from the grave's dark night.
But blind love and my dull mind so misled,
I sought to trespass even by main force
Where to have won my precious soul were dead.
Blessèd be she who shaped mine erring course
To better port, by turns who curb'd and lured
My bold and passionate will where safety was secured.

MACGREGOR.


...

Departed to the judgment,
A mighty afternoon;
Great clouds like ushers leaning,
Creation looking on.

The flesh surrendered, cancelled,
The bodiless begun;
Two worlds, like audiences, disperse
And leave the soul alone.

If after rude and boisterous seas
My wearied pinnace here finds ease;
If so it be I've gain'd the shore,
With safety of a faithful oar;
If having run my barque on ground,
Ye see the aged vessel crown'd;
What's to be done?but on the sands
Ye dance and sing, and now clap hands.
The first act's doubtful, but (we say)
It is the last commends the Play.