We sat together at one summer's end, That beautiful mild woman, your close friend, And you and I, and talked of poetry. I said, "A line will take us hours maybe; Yet if it does not seem a moment's thought,...
"Thou look'st upon me, and dost fondly think, Poet! that, stricken as both are by years, We, differing once so much, are now Compeers, Prepared, when each has stood his time, to sink...
Brief words, when actions wait, are well: The prompter's hand is on his bell; The coming heroes, lovers, kings, Are idly lounging at the wings; Behind the curtain's mystic fold...
What way does the wind come? What way does he go? He rides over the water, and over the snow, Through wood, and through vale; and, o'er rocky height Which the goat cannot climb, takes his sounding flight;...
Thou's welcome, wean, mischanter fa' me, If ought of thee, or of thy mammy, Shall ever daunton me, or awe me, My sweet wee lady, Or if I blush when thou shalt ca' me Tit-ta or daddy. ...
Child of loud-throated War! the mountain Stream Roars in thy hearing; but thy hour of rest Is come, and thou art silent in thy age; Save when the wind sweeps by and sounds are caught...
Calm resignation meets a happy end; And Providence, long-trusted, brings a friend. God's will be done, be patient and be good; Elisha was, and ravens brought him food:...
The twilight reigns above the fallen noon Within an ancient land, whose after-time Lies like a shadow o'er its ruined prime. Like rising mist the night increases soon...
Allus when our Pa he's away Nen Uncle Sidney comes to stay At our house here - so Ma an' me An' Etty an' Lee-Bob won't be Afeard ef anything at night Might happen - like Ma says it might. ...
'Twas in the felon's dock he stood, his eyes were black and blue; His voice with grief was broken, and his nose was broken, too; He muttered, as that broken nose he wiped upon his cap,...
Bring me a quart of colonial beer And some doughy damper to make good cheer, I must make a heavy dinner; Heavily dine and heavily sup, Of indigestible things fill up,...
Advance, come forth from thy Tyrolean ground, Dear Liberty! stern Nymph of soul untamed; Sweet Nymph, O rightly of the mountains named! Through the long chain of Alps from mound to mound...
Fasten your hair with a golden pin, And bind up every wandering tress; I bade my heart build these poor rhymes: It worked at them, day out, day in, Building a sorrowful loveliness...
I Wander by the edge Of this desolate lake Where wind cries in the sedge Until the axle break That keeps the stars in their round And hands hurl in the deep The banners of East and West...
Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, Enwrought with golden and silver light, The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half light, I would spread the cloths under your feet:...