A precious, mouldering pleasure 't is
To meet an antique book,
In just the dress his century wore;
A privilege, I think,

His venerable hand to take,
And warming in our own,
A passage back, or two, to make
To times when he was young.

His quaint opinions to inspect,
His knowledge to unfold
On what concerns our mutual mind,
The literature of old;

What interested scholars most,
What competitions ran
When Plato was a certainty.
And Sophocles a man;

When Sappho was a living girl,
And Beatrice wore
The gown that Dante deified.
Facts, centuries before,

He traverses familiar,
As one should come to town
And tell you all your dreams were true;
He lived where dreams were sown.

His presence is ench...

The last sunbeam
Lightly falls from the finish'd Sabbath,
On the pavement here--and there beyond, it is looking,
Down a new-made double grave.


Lo! the moon ascending!
Up from the east, the silvery round moon;
Beautiful over the house tops, ghastly phantom moon;
Immense and silent moon.


I see a sad procession,
And I hear the sound of coming full-key'd bugles;
All the channels of the city streets they're flooding,
As with voices and with tears.


I hear the great drums pounding,
And the small drums steady whirring;
And every blow of the great convulsive drums,
Strikes me through and through.


For the son is brought with the father;
In the foremost ranks of the fierce assault they fell;
Two veterans, son and ...

Here, where, of havoc tired and rash undoing,
Man left this Structure to become Time's prey
A soothing spirit follows in the way
That Nature takes, her counter-work pursuing.
See how her Ivy clasps the sacred Ruin
Fall to prevent or beautify decay;
And, on the mouldered walls, how bright, how gay,
The flowers in pearly dews their bloom renewing!
Thanks to the place, blessings upon the hour;
Even as I speak the rising Sun's first smile
Gleams on the grass-crowned top of yon tall Tower
Whose cawing occupants with joy proclaim
Prescriptive title to the shattered pile
Where, Cavendish, 'thine' seems nothing but a name!

Wouldst know what tricks, by the pale moonlight,
    Are played by me, the merry little Sprite,
Who wing thro' air from the camp to the court,
From king to clown, and of all make sport;
        Singing, I am the Sprite
        Of the merry midnight,
Who laugh at weak mortals and love the moonlight.

To a miser's bed, where he snoring slept
And dreamt of his cash, I slyly crept;
Chink, chink o'er his pillow like money I rang,
And he waked to catch--but away I sprang,
        Singing, I am the Sprite, etc.

I saw thro' the leaves, in a damsel's bower,
She was waiting her love at that starlight hour:
"Hist--hist!" quoth I, with an amorous sigh,
And she flew to the door, but away flew I,
        Singing, I am the Sprite, etc.

While a bard sat ...

What a silly bobolink,
Down in the meadow grasses!
What can the noisy fellow think,
When, to everyone who passes,
He calls out cheerily,
"Here, here is my nest! See! see!"

He could hide the summer through
In the thick, sweet-smelling clover,
Nor could anyone from dawn to dew,
His little house discover,
Did he not make so free
With the secret--"Here! see! see!"

Little Ted has ears and eyes,
And how can he keep from knowing
Just where the cosy treasure lies,
When bobolink, coming, going,
Shouts, plain as plain can be,
"Here, here is a nest! See! see!"

And Teddy would like to creep
Tip-toe across the meadow,
And for just one minute stoop and peep
Under the clover shadow.
He would do no harm--not he!
But would o...

I

Beneath the vine-clad eaves,
Whose shadows fall before
Thy lowly cottage door,
Under the lilac's tremulous leaves,
Within thy snowy clasped hand
The purple flowers it bore.
Last eve in dreams, I saw thee stand,
Like queenly nymph from Fairy-land,
Enchantress of the flowery wand,
Most beauteous Isadore!


II

And when I bade the dream
Upon thy spirit flee,
Thy violet eyes to me
Upturned, did overflowing seem
With the deep, untold delight
Of Love's serenity;
Thy classic brow, like lilies white
And pale as the Imperial Night
Upon her throne, with stars bedight,
Enthralled my soul to thee!


III

Ah! ever I behold
Thy dreamy, passionate eyes,
Blue as the languid skies
Hung with...

I.

There is no rhyme that is half so sweet
As the song of the wind in the rippling wheat;
There is no metre that's half so fine
As the lilt of the brook under rock and vine;
And the loveliest lyric I ever heard
Was the wildwood strain of a forest bird.
If the wind and the brook and the bird would teach
My heart their beautiful parts of speech,
And the natural art that they say these with,
My soul would sing of beauty and myth
In a rhyme and metre that none before
Have sung in their love, or dreamed in their lore,
And the world would be richer one poet the more.

II.

A thought to lift me up to those
Sweet wildflowers of the pensive woods;
The lofty, lowly attitudes
Of bluet and of bramble-rose:
To lift me where my mind may reach<...

Out of the world he must, who once comes in.
No man exempted is from death, or sin.

Selkirk, 13 May, 1787.

    Auld chukie Reekie's[1] sair distrest,
    Down droops her ance weel-burnisht crest,
    Nae joy her bonnie buskit nest
        Can yield ava,
    Her darling bird that she lo'es best,
        Willie's awa!

    O Willie was a witty wight,
    And had o' things an unco slight;
    Auld Reekie ay he keepit tight,
        An' trig an' braw:
    But now they'll busk her like a fright,
        Willie's awa!

    The stiffest o' them a' he bow'd;
    The bauldest o' them a' he cow'd;
    They durst nae mair than he allow'd,
        That was a law;
    We've lost a birkie weel worth gowd,
        Willie's awa!

    Now gawkies, tawpies, gowks, and fools,
    Frae colleges an...

Tune - "Good-night, and joy be wi' you a'."


I.

    Adieu! a heart-warm, fond adieu!
        Dear brothers of the mystic tie!
    Ye favour'd, ye enlighten'd few,
        Companions of my social joy!
    Tho' I to foreign lands must hie,
        Pursuing Fortune's slidd'ry ba',
    With melting heart, and brimful eye,
        I'll mind you still, tho' far awa'.

II.

    Oft have I met your social band,
        And spent the cheerful, festive night;
    Oft honour'd with supreme command,
        Presided o'er the sons of light:
    And by that hieroglyphic bright,
        Which none but craftsmen ever saw!
    Strong mem'ry on my heart shall write
        Those happy scenes when far awa'.

III.

 ...

A power is on the earth and in the air,
From which the vital spirit shrinks afraid,
And shelters him, in nooks of deepest shade,
From the hot steam and from the fiery glare.
Look forth upon the earth, her thousand plants
Are smitten; even the dark sun-loving maize
Faints in the field beneath the torrid blaze;
The herd beside the shaded fountain pants;
For life is driven from all the landscape brown;
The bird has sought his tree, the snake his den,
The trout floats dead in the hot stream, and men
Drop by the sun-stroke in the populous town:
As if the Day of Fire had dawned, and sent
Its deadly breath into the firmament.

Tutta la mia fiorita e verde etade.

JUST WHEN HE MIGHT FAIRLY HOPE SOME RETURN OF AFFECTION, ENVIOUS DEATH CARRIES HER OFF.


    All my green years and golden prime of man
Had pass'd away, and with attemper'd sighs
My bosom heaved--ere yet the days arise
When life declines, contracting its brief span.
Already my loved enemy began
To lull suspicion, and in sportive guise,
With timid confidence, though playful, wise,
In gentle mockery my long pains to scan:
The hour was near when Love, at length, may mate
With Chastity; and, by the dear one's side,
The lover's thoughts and words may freely flow:
Death saw, with envy, my too happy state,
E'en its fair promise--and, with fatal pride,
Strode in the midway forth, an armèd foe!

DACRE.

        Down on the Lumbee river
            Where the eddies ripple cool
        Your boat, I know, glides stealthily
            About some shady pool.
        The summer's heats have lulled asleep
            The fish-hawk's chattering noise,
        And all the swamp lies hushed about
            You sunburnt boys.

        You see the minnow's waves that rock
            The cradled lily leaves.
        From a far field some farmer's song,
            Singing among his sheaves,
        Comes mellow to you where you sit,
            Each man with boatman's poise,
        There, in the shimmering water lights,
            You sunburnt boys.

        I know your haunts:    each gnarly bole
            That guards the waterside,
        Ea...

At My Fireside

Alone, beneath the darkened sky,
With saddened heart and unstrung lyre,
I heap the spoils of years gone by,
And leave them with a long-drawn sigh,
Like drift-wood brands that glimmering lie,
Before the ashes hide the fire.

Let not these slow declining days
The rosy light of dawn outlast;
Still round my lonely hearth it plays,
And gilds the east with borrowed rays,
While memory's mirrored sunset blaze
Flames on the windows of the past.

March 1, 1888.

Thou two-faced year, Mother of Change and Fate,
Didst weep when Spain cast forth with flaming sword,
The children of the prophets of the Lord,
Prince, priest, and people, spurned by zealot hate.
Hounded from sea to sea, from state to state,
The West refused them, and the East abhorred.
No anchorage the known world could afford,
Close-locked was every port, barred every gate.
Then smiling, thou unveil'dst, O two-faced year,
A virgin world where doors of sunset part,
Saying, "Ho, all who weary, enter here!
There falls each ancient barrier that the art
Of race or creed or rank devised, to rear
Grim bulwarked hatred between heart and heart!"

1883.

    Three score and ten, the psalmist saith,
    And half my course is well-nigh run;
    I've had my flout at dusty death,
    I've had my whack of feast and fun.
    I've mocked at those who prate and preach;
    I've laughed with any man alive;
    But now with sobered heart I reach
    The Great Divide of Thirty-five.

    And looking back I must confess
    I've little cause to feel elate.
    I've played the mummer more or less;
    I fumbled fortune, flouted fate.
    I've vastly dreamed and little done;
    I've idly watched my brothers strive:
    Oh, I have loitered in the sun
    By primrose paths to Thirty-five!

    And those who matched me in the race,
    Well, some are out and trampled down;
    The others jog with sober pac...

There stands in th' leafless Ghetto
One spare-leaved, ancient tree;
Above the Ghetto noises
It moans eternally.

In wonderment it muses,
And murmurs with a sigh:
"Alas! how God-forsaken
And desolate am I!

"Alas, the stony alleys,
And noises loud and bold!
Where are ye, birds of summer?
Where are ye, woods of old?

"And where, ye breezes balmy
That wandered vagrant here?
And where, oh sweep of heavens
So deep and blue and clear?

"Where are ye, mighty giants?
Ye come not riding by
Upon your fiery horses,
A-whistling merrily.

"Of other days my dreaming,
Of other days, ah me!
When sturdy hero-races
Lived wild and glad and free!

"The old sun shone, how brightly!
The old lark sang, what s...

Lycidas

Thyrsis, the music of that murm'ring spring,
Is not so mournful as the strains you sing.
Nor rivers winding thro' the vales below,
So sweetly warble, or so smoothly flow.
Now sleeping flocks on their soft fleeces lie,
The moon, serene in glory, mounts the sky,
Wile silent birds forget their tuneful lays,
Oh sing of Daphne's fate, and Daphne's praise!

Thyrsis

Behold the groves that shine with silver frost,
Their beauty wither'd, and their verdure lost.
Here shall I try the sweet Alexis' strain,
That call'd the list'ning Dryads to the plain?
Thames heard the numbers as he flow'd along,
And bade his willows learn the moving song.

Lycidas

So may kind rains their vital moisture yield,
And swell the future harvest of t...