“The poets pour us wine”
Said the dearest poet I ever knew,
Dearest and greatest and best to me.
You clamor athirst for poetry
We pour. “But when shall a vintage be”
You cry, “strong grape, squeezed gold from screw.
Yet sweet juice, flavored flowery-fine?
That were indeed the wine!”

One pours your cup, stark strength,
Meat for a man; and you eye the pulp
Strained, turbid still, from the viscous blood
Of the snaky bough: and you grumble “Good!
For it swells resolve, breeds hardihood;
Dispatch it, then, in a single gulp!”
So, down, with a wry face, goes at length
The liquor: stuff for strength.

One pours your cup, sheer sweet,
The fragrant fumes of a year condensed:
Suspicion of all that’s ripe or rathe,
From the bud on branch to the g...

In the rapture of life and of living,
    I lift up my heart and rejoice,
And I thank the great Giver for giving
    The soul of my gladness a voice.
In the glow of the glorious weather,
    In the sweet-scented sensuous air,
My burdens seem light as a feather -
    They are nothing to bear.

In the strength and the glory of power,
    In the pride and the pleasure of wealth,
(For who dares dispute me my dower
    Of talents and youth-time and health?)
I can laugh at the world and its sages -
    I am greater than seers who are sad,
For he is most wise in all ages
    Who knows how to be glad.

I lift up my eyes to Apollo,
    The god of the beautiful days,
And my spirit soars off like a swallow
    And is lost in the light of its rays...

Just see that we get full value
Of that for which we have paid.
The price has been a heavy one,
But the goods are there--and we've paid-.
We've paid in our toil and our woundings;
We've paid in the blood we've shed;
We've paid in our bitter hardships;
We've paid with our many dead.

It's not payment in kind we ask for,
Two wrongs don't make much of a right.
All we ask is--that, what we have paid for,
You secure for us, all right and tight.

The Peace of the World's what we're after;
We've all had enough of King Cain,
And the Kaiser and all his bully-men,
With their World-Power big on the brain.

No!--we fought with a definite object,
And it's this--and we want it made plain,--
That it's God, and not any devil,
That's to rule in th...

Put forth thy leaf, thou lofty plane,
East wind and frost are safely gone;
With zephyr mild and balmy rain
The summer comes serenly on;
Earth, air, and sun and skies combine
To promise all that's kind and fair: -
But thou, O human heart of mine,
Be still, contain thyself, and bear.

December days were brief and chill,
The winds of March were wild and drear,
And, nearing and receding still,
Spring never would, we thought, be here.
The leaves that burst, the suns that shine,
Had, not the less, their certain date: -
And thou, O human heart of mine,
Be still, refrain thyself, and wait.

One moment bid the horses wait,
Since tiffin is not laid till three,
Below the upward path and straight
You climbed a year ago with me.
Love came upon us suddenly
And loosed, an idle hour to kill,
A headless, armless armory
That smote us both on Jakko Hill.

Ah Heaven! we would wait and wait
Through Time and to Eternity!
Ah Heaven! we could conquer Fate
With more than Godlike constancy
I cut the date upon a tree,
Here stand the clumsy figures still:
"10-7-85, A.D."
Damp with the mist of Jakko Hill.

What came of high resolve and great,
And until Death fidelity!
Whose horse is waiting at your gate?
Whose 'rickshaw-wheels ride over me?
No Saint's, I swear; and, let me see
To-night what names your programme fill,
We drift a...

        Here industry is not in vain,
        For we have bounteous crops of grain,
        And you behold on every field
        Of grass and roots abundant yield,
        But after all the greatest charm
        Is the snug home upon the farm,
        And stone walls now keep cattle warm.

Naples, 1849


Through the great sinful streets of Naples as I past,
With fiercer heat than flamed above my head
My heart was hot within me; till at last
My brain was lightened, when my tongue had said
Christ is not risen!

Christ is not risen, no,
He lies and moulders low;
Christ is not risen.

What though the stone were rolled away, and though
The grave found empty there?
If not there, then elsewhere;
If not where Joseph laid Him first, why then
Where other men
Translaid Him after; in some humbler clay
Long ere to-day
Corruption that sad perfect work hath done,
Which here she scarcely, lightly had begun.
The foul engendered worm
Feeds on the flesh of the life-giving form
Of our most Holy and Anointed One.
<...

Montparnasse,

April 1914.

All day the sun has shone into my little attic, a bitter sunshine that brightened yet did not warm. And so as I toiled and toiled doggedly enough, many were the looks I cast at the three faggots I had saved to cook my evening meal. Now, however, my supper is over, my pipe alight, and as I stretch my legs before the embers I have at last a glow of comfort, a glimpse of peace.




My Garret



Here is my Garret up five flights of stairs;
Here's where I deal in dreams and ply in fancies,
Here is the wonder-shop of all my wares,
My sounding sonnets and my red romances.
Here's where I challenge Fate and ring my rhymes,
And grope at glory - aye, and starve at times.

Here is my Stronghold: stout of heart am I,
Gre...

("Roses et Papillons.")

[XXVII., Dec. 7, 1834.]


The grave receives us all:
Ye butterflies and roses gay and sweet
Why do ye linger, say?
Will ye not dwell together as is meet?
Somewhere high in the air
Would thy wing seek a home 'mid sunny skies,
In mead or mossy dell -
If there thy odors longest, sweetest rise.

Have where ye will your dwelling,
Or breath or tint whose praise we sing;
Butterfly shining bright,
Full-blown or bursting rosebud, flow'r or wing.
Dwell together ye fair,
'Tis a boon to the loveliest given;
Perchance ye then may choose your home
On the earth or in heaven.

W.C. WESTBROOK

Song and Chorus.




Up the Hudson!--Fleetly gliding
    To our haunts among the trees!
Joy the gallant vessel guiding
    With a fresh and cheerful breeze!
Wives and dear ones yearn to meet us--
    (Hearts that love us to the core!)
And with fond expressions greet us
    As we near the welcome shore!


Chorus.


Ho! ye inland seas and islands!--
    (Echo follows where we go!)
Ho! ye headlands, hills, and highlands!
    Ho! ye Undercliffeans, ho!


Up the Hudson!--Rock and river,
    Grove and glen pronounce His praise,
Who, of every "Good the Giver,"
    Leads us through these pleasant ways!--
Care recedes like water-traces
    Of our bark, as on we glide,
Where the hand of nature graces<...

Two children of the olden time
    In Flora's primrose season,
Were born.    The name of one was Rhyme
    That of the other Reason.
And both were beautiful and fair,
And pure as mountain stream and air.

As the boys together grew,
    Happy fled their hours--
Grief or care they never knew
    In the Paphian bowers.
See them roaming, hand in hand,
The pride of all the choral band!

Music with harp of golden strings,
    Love with bow and quiver,
Airy sprites on radiant wings,
    Nymphs of wood and river,
Joined the Muses' constant song,
As Rhyme and Reason passed along.

But the scene was changed--the boys
    Left their native soil--
Rhyme's pursuit was idle joys,
    Reason's manly toil:
Soon Rhyme was starving i...

Tune - "Blue Bonnets."


I.

    Powers celestial! whose protection
        Ever guards the virtuous fair,
    While in distant climes I wander,
        Let my Mary be your care:
    Let her form sae fair and faultless,
        Fair and faultless as your own,
    Let my Mary's kindred spirit
        Draw your choicest influence down.

II.

    Make the gales you waft around her
        Soft and peaceful as her breast;
    Breathing in the breeze that fans her,
        Soothe her bosom into rest:
    Guardian angels! O protect her,
        When in distant lands I roam;
    To realms unknown while fate exiles me,
        Make her bosom still my home.

Introductory

Art thou beautiful, O my daughter, as the budding rose of April?
Are all thy motions music, and is poetry throned in thine eye?
Then hearken unto me; and I will make the bud a fair flower,
I will plant it upon the bank of Elegance, and water it with the water of Cologne;
And in the season it shall "come out," yea bloom, the pride of the parterre;
Ladies shall marvel at its beauty, and a Lord shall pluck it at the last.

Of Propriety.

Study first Propriety: for she is indeed the Polestar
Which shall guide the artless maiden through the mazes of Vanity Fair;
Nay, she is the golden chain which holdeth together Society;
The lamp by whose light young Psyche shall approach unblamed her Eros.
Verily Truth is as Eve, which was ashamed being naked;
Where...

I hold it the duty of one who is gifted
    And specially dowered in all men's sight,
To know no rest till his life is lifted
    Fully up to his great gifts' height.

He must mould the man into rare completeness,
    For gems are set only in gold refined.
He must fashion his thoughts into perfect sweetness.
    And cast out folly and pride from his mind.

For he who drinks from a god's gold fountain
    Of art or music or rhythmic song
Must sift from his soul the chaff of malice,
    And weed from his heart the roots of wrong.

Great gifts should be worn, like a crown befitting,
    And not like gems in a beggar's hands!
And the toil must be constant and unremitting
    Which lifts up the king to the crown's demands.

None, none can tell where I shall be
When the unclean earth covers me;
Only in surety if thou cry
Where my perplexed ashes lie,
Know, 'tis but death's necessity
That keeps my tongue from answering thee.

Even if no more my shadow may
Lean for a moment in thy day;
No more the whole earth lighten, as if,
Thou near, it had nought else to give:
Surely 'tis but Heaven's strategy
To prove death immortality.

Yet should I sleep - and no more dream,
Sad would the last awakening seem,
If my cold heart, with love once hot,
Had thee in sleep remembered not:
How could I wake to find that I
Had slept alone, yet easefully?

Or should in sleep glad visions come:
Sick, in an alien land, for home
Would be my eyes in their bright beam;
Aw...

Ghosts walk the Earth, that rise not from the grave.
The Dead Past hath its living dead. We see
All suddenly, at times, and shudder then,
Their faces pale, and sad accusing eyes.

Last night, within the crowded street, I saw
A Phantom from the Past, with pallid face
And hollow eyes, and pale, cold lips, and hair
Faded from that imperial hue of gold
Which was my pride in days that are no more.

That pallid face I knew in its young bloom,
A radiant lily with a rose-flushed heart,
Most beautiful, a vision of delight;
And seeing it again, so changed, so changed,
I felt as if the icy hand of Death
Had touched my forehead and his voice said “Come!”

Ah, pale, cold lips that once were rosy-red!
Lips I have kissed on golden afternoons,
Past, past, ...

She put her wedding-gown away
As tenderly as one might close,
With kissing lips and finger-tips,
The petals of a rose
Still held for the Belovèd's sake--
The loveliest that blows.

She put her wedding-gown away--
The quiet place was all astir
With vague perfume that filled the room,
Cedar and lavender,
Yet sweeter still about it clung
The fragrant thoughts of her.

She put her wedding-gown away--
Yet lingered where its whiteness gleamed
As one above a sleeping Love,
Oh, thus it was she seemed,
Reluctant still to turn and go
And leave him as he dreamed.

Mounted on Kyrat strong and fleet,
His chestnut steed with four white feet,
    Roushan Beg, called Kurroglou,
Son of the road and bandit chief,
Seeking refuge and relief,
    Up the mountain pathway flew.

Such was Kyrat's wondrous speed,
Never yet could any steed
    Reach the dust-cloud in his course.
More than maiden, more than wife,
More than gold and next to life
    Roushan the Robber loved his horse.

In the land that lies beyond
Erzeroum and Trebizond,
    Garden-girt his fortress stood;
Plundered khan, or caravan
Journeying north from Koordistan,
    Gave him wealth and wine and food.

Seven hundred and fourscore
Men at arms his livery wore,
    Did his bidding night and day.
Now, through regions all unknown,