Works

Well, there's the brazier set by the temple door:
Blue flames run over the coals and flicker through.
There are cool spaces of sky between white clouds -
But what are flames and spaces but eyes of blue?
...

One Sabbath day my friend and I
After the meeting, quietly
Passed from the crowded village lanes,
White with dry dust for lack of rains,
And climbed the neighboring slope, with feet...

White clouds and buds and birds and bees,
Low wind-notes piped from southern seas,
Brought thee a rose-white offering,
A flower-like baby with the Spring.

She, as her April, gave to thee...

Elenor Murray asked to go in training
And came to see me, but the school was full,
We could not take her. Then she asked to stand
Upon a list and wait, I put her off....

The stars are steady abune;
I' the water they flichter and flee;
But, steady aye, luikin doon
They ken theirsels i' the sea.

A' licht, and clear, and free,
God, thou shinest abune;...

The mystery of Life, the mystery
Of Death, I see
Darkly as in a glass;
Their shadows pass,
And talk with me.

As the flush of a Morning Sky,
As a Morning Sky colorless -...

True mirth resides not in the smiling skin;
The sweetest solace is to act no sin.

'O cast away your sorrow;
A while, at least, be gay!
If grief must come tomorrow,
At least, be glad today!

'How can you still be sighing
When smiles are everywhere?...

Ever at the far side of the current
The fishes hurl and swim,
For pelicans and great birds
Watch and go fishing
On the bank-side.

No man dare go alone
In the dim great forest,...

Out of my heart, one day, I wrote a song,
With my heart's blood imbued,
Instinct with passion, tremulously strong,
With grief subdued;
Breathing a fortitude
Pain-bought....

'A poet'! He hath put his heart to school,
Nor dares to move unpropped upon the staff
Which Art hath lodged within his hand must laugh
By precept only, and shed tears by rule....

Feel for the wrongs to universal ken
Daily exposed, woe that unshrouded lies;
And seek the Sufferer in his darkest den,
Whether conducted to the spot by sighs
And moanings, or he dwells (as if the wren...

The most alluring clouds that mount the sky
Owe to a troubled element their forms,
Their hues to sunset. If with raptured eye
We watch their splendour, shall we covet storms,...

Portentous change when History can appear
As the cool Advocate of foul device;
Reckless audacity extol, and jeer
At consciences perplexed with scruples nice!
They who bewail not, must abhor, the sneer...

Who ponders National events shall find
An awful balancing of loss and gain,
Joy based on sorrow, good with ill combined,
And proud deliverance issuing out of pain...

Long-favoured England! be not thou misled
By monstrous theories of alien growth,
Lest alien frenzy seize thee, waxing wroth,
Self-smitten till thy garments reek dyed red...

Lo! where she stands fixed in a saint-like trance,
One upward hand, as if she needed rest
From rapture, lying softly on her breast!
Nor wants her eyeball an ethereal glance;...

Men of the Western World! in Fate's dark book
Whence these opprobrious leaves of dire portent?
Think ye your British Ancestors forsook
Their native Land, for outrage provident;...

AS a butterfly renew'd,

When in life I breath'd my last,

To the spots my flight I wing,

Scenes of heav'nly rapture past,

Over meadows, to the spring,...

I busied myself to find a sure
Snug hermitage
That should preserve my Love secure
From the world's rage;
Where no unseemly saturnals,
Or strident traffic-roars,
Or hum of intervolved cabals...