Rain on the face of the sea,
    Rain on the sodden land,
And the window-pane is blurred with rain
    As I watch it, pen in hand.

Mist on the face of the sea,
    Mist on the sodden land,
Filling the vales as daylight fails,
    And blotting the desolate sand.

Voices from out of the mist,
    Calling to one another:
"Hath love an end, thou more than friend,
    Thou dearer than ever brother?"

Voices from out of the mist,
    Calling and passing away;
But I cannot speak, for my voice is weak,
    And ... this is the end of my lay.

Roses ruddy and roses white,
What are the joys that my heart discloses?
Sitting alone in the fading light
Memories come to me here tonight
With the wonderful scent of the big red roses.

Memories come as the daylight fades
Down on the hearth where the firelight dozes;
Flicker and flutter the lights and shades,
And I see the face of a queen of maids
Whose memory comes with the scent of roses.

Visions arise of a scent of mirth,
And a ball-room belle who superbly poses,
A queenly woman of queenly worth,
And I am the happiest man on earth
With a single flower from a bunch of roses.

Only her memory lives tonight,
God in his wisdom her young life closes;
Over her grave may the turf be light,
Cover her coffin with roses white
She was a...

Upon my smile let none pass compliment
    If it but gleam like an enchanting ray
    Of sunshine caught from some sweet summer day,
    In atmosphere of rose and jasmine scent
And breath of honeysuckles redolent,
    When, with the birds that sing their lives away
    In harmony, the treetops bend and sway,
And all the world with joy is eloquent.

But in that day of gloom when skies severe
    Portend the tempest gathering overhead,
If by my face some token shall appear
    Inspiring hope, dispelling darksome dread,
    Oh, be the rapture mine that it be said,
"Her smile is like the rainbow, full of cheer."

Here stands the great tree still, with broad, bent head,
And wide arms grown aweary, yet outspread
With their old blessing. But wan memory weaves
Strange garlands now amongst the darkening leaves.
        And the moon hangs low in the elm.

Beneath these glimmering arches Jessamine
Walked with her lover long ago, and in
This moon-made shade he questioned; and she spoke:
Then on them both love's rarer radiance broke.
        And the moon hangs low in the elm.

Sweet Jessamine we called her; for she shone
Like blossoms that in sun and shade have grown,
Gathering from each alike a perfect white,
Whose rich bloom breaks opaque through darkest night.
        And the moon hangs low in the elm.

And for this sweetness Walt, her lover, s...

    Maurice, weep not, I am not here under this pine tree.
    The balmy air of spring whispers through the sweet grass,
    The stars sparkle, the whippoorwill calls,
    But thou grievest, while my soul lies rapturous
    In the blest Nirvana of eternal light!
    Go to the good heart that is my husband
    Who broods upon what he calls our guilty love: -
    Tell him that my love for you, no less than my love for him
    Wrought out my destiny - that through the flesh
    I won spirit, and through spirit, peace.
    There is no marriage in heaven
    But there is love.

Broke to every known mischance, lifted over all
By the light sane joy of life, the buckler of the Gaul,
Furious in luxury, merciless in toil,
Terrible with strength that draws from her tireless soil;
Strictest judge of her own worth, gentlest of man's mind,
First to follow Truth and last to leave old Truths behind,
France beloved of every soul that loves its fellow-kind!

Ere our birth (rememberest thou?) side by side we lay
Fretting in the womb of Rome to begin our fray.
Ere men knew our tongues apart, our one task was known,
Each to mould the other's fate as he wrought his own.
To this end we stirred mankind till all Earth was ours,
Till our world-end strifes begat wayside Thrones and Powers,
Puppets that we made or broke to bar the other's path,
Necessary, outpo...

Once a great love cut my life in two.
The first part goes on twisting
at some other place like a snake cut in two.

The passing years have calmed me
and brought healing to my heart and rest to my eyes.

And I'm like someone standing in the Judean desert, looking at a sign:
"Sea Level"
He cannot see the sea, but he knows.

Thus I remember your face everywhere
at your "face Level."

From the heart of Waumbek Methna, from the lake that never fails,
Falls the Saco in the green lap of Conway's intervales;
There, in wild and virgin freshness, its waters foam and flow,
As when Darby Field first saw them, two hundred years ago.

But, vexed in all its seaward course with bridges, dams, and mills,
How changed is Saco's stream, how lost its freedom of the hills,
Since travelled Jocelyn, factor Vines, and stately Champernoon
Heard on its banks the gray wolf's howl, the trumpet of the loon!

With smoking axle hot with speed, with steeds of fire and steam,
Wide-waked To-day leaves Yesterday behind him like a dream.
Still, from the hurrying train of Life, fly backward far and fast
The milestones of the fathers, the landmarks of the past.

But human hearts ...

Why should the Enthusiast, journeying through this Isle
Repine as if his hour were come too late?
Not unprotected in her mouldering state,
Antiquity salutes him with a smile,
'Mid fruitful fields that ring with jocund toil,
And pleasure-grounds where Taste, refined Co-mate
Of Truth and Beauty, strives to imitate,
Far as she may, primeval Nature's style.
Fair land! by Time's parental love made free,
By Social Order's watchful arms embraced;
With unexampled union meet in thee,
For eye and mind, the present and the past;
With golden prospect for futurity,
If that be reverenced which ought to last.

Last night, when at parting
    Awhile we did stand,
Suddenly starting,
    There fell on my hand

Something that burned it,
    Something that shone
In the moon as I turned it,
    And then it was gone.

One bright stray jewel--
    What made it stray?
Was I cold or cruel,
    At the close of day?

Oh, do not cry, lass!
    What is crying worth?
There is no lass like my lass
    In the whole wide earth.

Hadst thou a ship, in whose vast hold lay stored
The priceless riches of all climes and lands,
Say, wouldst thou let it float upon the seas
Unpiloted, of fickle winds the sport,
And of wild waves and hidden rocks the prey?

Thine is that ship; and in its depths concealed
Lies all the wealth of this vast universe -
Yea, lies some part of God's omnipotence,
The legacy divine of every soul.
Thy will, O man, thy will is that great ship,
And yet behold it drifting here and there -
One moment lying motionless in port,
Then on high seas by sudden impulse flung,
Then drying on the sands, and yet again
Sent forth on idle quests to no-man's land
To carry nothing and to nothing bring;
Till, worn and fretted by the aimless strife
And buffeted by vacillating wind...

    I am coming, coming to thee,
    My strong-armed lover, the Sea!
On thy great broad breast I will lie and rest,
    And thou shalt talk to me.

    I have come to thee, all unsought,
    I have stolen an hour from thought,
And peace and power thou canst give in that hour,
    Which thy rival Earth gives not.

    Alone here, under the sky,
    And the whole world drifting by!
Thy breast of brine thrills close to mine,
    While the cloudless sun sails high.

    I fly, but thou givest chase -
    Thy kisses are on my face!
Be bold and free as thou wilt, O Sea,
    There is life in thy close embrace.

    Throat and cheek and tress
    Are damp where thy salt lips press!
There is strength and bliss in thy daring kiss,
    ...

Not only on cross and gibbet,
By sword, and fire, and flood,
Have perished the world’s sad martyrs
Whose names are writ in blood.

A woman lay in a hovel,
Mean, dismal, gasping for breath;
One friend alone was beside her,
The name of him was, Death.

For the sake of her orphan children,
For money to buy them food,
She had slaved in the dismal hovel
And wasted her womanhood.

Winter and Spring and Summer
Came each with a load of cares;
And Autumn to her brought only
A harvest of gray hairs.

Far out in the blessèd country,
Beyond the smoky town,
The winds of God were blowing
Evermore up and down;

The trees were waving signals
Of joy from the bush beyond;
The gum its blue-green banner,
The fern its dar...

(P McD)


We waited for him, and the anxious days
    Melted to years and floated slowly by
We spoke of him kind words of lofty praise,
    Of yearning love and tender sympathy.

We laid by what was his with reverent care--
    Started in dreams to greet him coming home--
But hope deferred left no relief but prayer,
    And heart-sore longings breathed in one word--Come.

We never dreamed of murderous ambush laid
    By savage redskins greedy for the prey--
Of him, our darling, in the forest laid
    Alone, alone, ebbing his life away.

He who would not have harmed the meanest thing,
    Who carried gentleness to such excess
That, to the stranger and the suffering,
    His purse meant help, his touch was a caress.

Ah me! tha...

O hide me in Thy love, secure
From this earth-clinging meanness.
Lave my uncleanness
In Thy compassionating love!

Bury this treachery as deep
As mercy is enrooted.
My days ill-fruited
Shake till the shrivelled burden fall.

Put by those righteous arrows, Lord,
Put even Thy justice by Thee;
So I come nigh Thee
As came the Magdalen to Thy feet.

And like a heavy stone that's cast
In a pool, on Thee I throw me,
And feel o'erflow me
Ripples of pity, deep waves of love.

And said I that all hope was fled,
That sorrow and despair were mine,
That each enthusiast wish was dead,
Had sank beneath pale Misery's shrine. -

Seest thou the sunbeam's yellow glow,
That robes with liquid streams of light;
Yon distant Mountain's craggy brow.
And shows the rocks so fair, - so bright -

Tis thus sweet expectation's ray,
In softer view shows distant hours,
And portrays each succeeding day,
As dressed in fairer, brighter flowers, -

The vermeil tinted flowers that blossom;
Are frozen but to bud anew,
Then sweet deceiver calm my bosom,
Although thy visions be not true, -

Yet true they are, - and I'll believe,
Thy whisperings soft of love and peace,
God never made thee to deceive,
'Tis sin that bade thy empire...

    It's a mighty good world, so it is, dear lass,
    When even the worst is said.
    There's a smile and a tear, a sigh and a cheer,
    But better be living than dead;
    A joy and a pain, a loss and a gain;
    There's honey and may be some gall:
    Yet still I declare, foul weather or fair,
    It's a mighty good world after all.

    For look, lass! at night when I break from the fight,
    My Kingdom's awaiting for me;
    There's comfort and rest, and the warmth of your breast,
    And little ones climbing my knee.
    There's fire-light and song - Oh, the world may be wrong!
    Its empires may topple and fall:
    My home is my care - if gladness be there,
    It's a mighty good world after all.

    O heart of pure gold! I have made you...

O Thou who standest both for God and Man,
O King of Kings, who wore no earthly crown,
O Prince of Peace, unto Thy feet we come,
                And lay our burden down.

The weight had grown beyond our strength to bear,
Thy Love alone the woful thrall can break,
Thy Love, reborn into this world of care,
                Alone can life remake.

How shall we turn to good this weight of ill?
How of our sorrows build anew to Thee?
"Of your own selves ye cannot stand or build,--
                Only through Me,--through Me!"

O, turn once more to Thee the hearts of men,
Work through the leaven of our grief and pain,
Let not these agonies be all in vain,
                Come, dwell with us again!

The world has nailed itself unto its cross;
O...