Works

Poi che spiegate.


Now that these wings to speed my wish ascend,
The more I feel vast air beneath my feet,
The more toward boundless air on pinions fleet,...

Oh, for a soul that fulfills
music like that of a bird!
thrilling with rapture the hills,
heedless if any one heard.

Or, like the flower that blooms
lone in the midst of the trees,...

Where are they - the Afterwhiles -
Luring us the lengthening miles
Of our lives? Where is the dawn
With the dew across the lawn
Stroked with eager feet the far
Way the hills and valleys are?...

In the black night, along the mud-deep roads,
Amid the threatening boughs and ghastly streams,
Hark! sounds that gird the darknesses like goads,
Murmurs and rumours and reverberant dreams,...

There is no rhyme that is half so sweet
As the song of the wind in the rippling wheat;
There is no metre that's half so fine
As the lilt of the brook under rock and vine;
And the loveliest lyric I ever heard...

Alice, I need not tell you that the Art
That copies Nature, even at its best,
Is but the echo of a splendid tone,
Or like the answer of a little child
To the deep question of some frosted sage....

Nature, that makes Professors all day long,
And, filling idle souls with idle song,
Turns out small Poets every other minute,
Made earth for men - but seldom puts men in it.
...

Everyone laughed at Col. Prichard
For buying an engine so powerful
That it wrecked itself, and wrecked the grinder
He ran it with.
But here is a joke of cosmic size:
The urge of nature that made a man...

Nobody knows the world but me.
The rest go to bed; I sit up and see.
I'm a better observer than any of you all,
For I never look out till the twilight fall,
And never then without green glasses,...

Profit?--Loss?
Who shall declare this good--that ill?--
When good and ill so intertwine
But to fulfil the vast design
Of an Omniscient Will?--
When seeming gain but turns to loss,--...

Achievin' sech distinction with his moddel tabble dote
Ez to make his Red Hoss Mountain restauraw a place uv note,
Our old friend Casey innovated somewhat round the place,...

Reader - gentle - if so be
Such still live, and live for me,
Will it please you to be told
What my tenscore pages hold?

Here are verses that in spite
Of myself I needs must write,...

The Master stood upon the mount, and taught.
He saw a fire in his disciples' eyes;
'The old law', they said, 'is wholly come to naught!
Behold the new world rise!'
...

There is no progress in the world of bees,
However wise and wonderful they are.
Their wisdom makes not increase. Lies the bar,
To wider goals, in that tense strife to please...

Let there be many windows to your soul,
That all the glory of the universe
May beautify it. Not the narrow pane
Of one poor creed can catch the radiant rays
That shine from countless sources. Tear away...

To each progressive soul there comes a day
When all things that have pleased and satisfied
Grow flavourless, the springs of joy seem dried.
No more the waters of youth's fountains play;...

This is the age of progress; and it is not slo progress nawther. The worst on it is, we're all forced to go on whether we like it or net, for if we stand still a minit, ther's somedy traidin' ov us heels, an' unless we move on ...

There is a poetry that speaks
Through common things: the grasshopper,
That in the hot weeds creaks and creaks,
Says all of summer to my ear:
And in the cricket's cry I hear...

The piece, to-night, is of peculiar kind,
For which the appropriate name is hard to find;
No Comedy, 'tis clear; nor can it be,
With strictest truth, pronounced a Tragedy;...

All in the golden afternoon
Full leisurely we glide;
For both our oars, with little skill,
By little arms are plied,
While little hands make vain pretense
Our wanderings to guide.
...