Works

He thought he saw an Elephant,
That practiced on a fife:
He looked again, and found it was
A letter from his wife.
'At length I realise,' he said,
The bitterness of Life!'
...

"it was at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts, and I had to sing
`Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!...

Good morrow to the day so fair;
Good morning, sir, to you;
Good morrow to mine own torn hair,
Bedabbled with the dew.

Good morning to this primrose too;
Good morrow to each maid;...

I sat on cushioned otter-skin:
My word was law from Ith to Emain,
And shook at Inver Amergin
The hearts of the world-troubling seamen,
And drove tumult and war away
From girl and boy and man and beast;...

Light through a little veil is all thy trace
Of halo, blessed Child!
The sorrow of the world is in thy face,
fair, undefiled!
dear and undefiled!

The kneeling boy, with pretty lips apart,...

The flabby wine-skin of his brain
Yields to some pathologic strain,
And voids from its unstored abysm
The driblet of an aphorism.

FOUNDED ON A LATE DISTRESSING INCIDENT.

1832-3.


'mutantem regna cometem."
LUCAN.[1]


"Tho' all the pet mischiefs we count upon fail,...

What hast thou seen, O wind,
Of beauty or of terror
Surpassing, denied to us,
That with precipitate wings,
Mad and ecstatical,
Thou spurnest the hollows and trees
That offer thee refuge of peace,...

O Madonna, pure and holy,
From sin's dark stain ever free,
Refuge of the sinner lowly,
I come - I come to thee!
Now with wreaths of sinful pleasure
Yet my tresses twined among;...

Now as at all times I can see in the mind's eye,
In their stiff, painted clothes, the pale unsatisfied ones
Appear and disappear in the blue depth of the sky
With all their ancient faces like rain-beaten stones,...

"The mountain was filled with the hosts of the Tuatha de Dannan."
--Old Celtic Poem


See where the auras from the olden fountain
Starward aspire;
The sacred sign upon the holy mountain...

You bear a flower in your hand,
You softly take it through the air,
Lest it should be too roughly fanned,
And break and fall, for all your care.

Love is like that, the lightest breath...

THE worst of ills, with jealousy compared,
Are trifling torments ev'ry where declared.

IMAGINE, to yourself a silly fool,
To dark suspicion grown an easy tool;
No soft repose he finds, by night or day;...

"Come, if thy magic Glass have power
"To call up forms we sigh to see;
"Show me my, love, in that, rosy bower,
"Where last she pledged her truth to me."

The Wizard showed him his Lady bright,...

Do I see a contest yonder?
See I miracles or pastimes?
Beauteous urchins, five in number,
'Gainst five sisters fair contending,
Measured is the time they're beating
At a bright enchantress' bidding....

What is the gold of mortal-kind
To that men find
Deep in the poet's mind!
That magic purse
Of Dreams from which
God builds His universe!
That makes life rich
With, many a vision;...

I. Thanksgiving.

Star, on thy Heaven-returning way,
Our message of thanksgiving bear;
To Him who answered with thy ray
The priestless Gentiles' trembling prayer.
...

I'll tell of the Magna Charter
As were signed at the Barons' command,
On Runningmead Island in t'middle of t'Thames
By King John, as were known as Lackland.

Some say it were wrong of the Barons...

A magnet hung in a hardware shop,
And all around was a loving crop
Of scissors and needles, nails and knives,
Offering love for all their lives;
But for iron the magnet felt no whim,...

1.
'Sleep, sleep on! forget thy pain;
My hand is on thy brow,
My spirit on thy brain;
My pity on thy heart, poor friend;
And from my fingers flow
The powers of life, and like a sign,...