Works

Roll on, thou ball, roll on!
Through pathless realms of Space
Roll on!
What, though I'm in a sorry case?
What, though I cannot meet my bills?
What, though I suffer toothache's ills?...

Will you conquer my heart with your beauty; my sould going out from afar?
Shall I fall to your hand as a victim of crafty and cautions shikar?
...

Both you two have
Relation to the grave:
And where
The funeral-trump sounds, you are there,

I shall be made,
Ere long, a fleeting shade:
Pray, come
And do some honour to my tomb.
...

Or ever the knightly years were gone
With the old world to the grave,
I was a King in Babylon
And you were a Christian Slave.

I saw, I took, I cast you by,
I bent and broke your pride....

Dedicated to Theodore Roosevelt


From the Cordilleran Highlands,
From the Height of Land
Far north.
From the Lake of the Woods,
From Rainy Lake,
From Itasca's springs....

To weave a garland for the rose.
And think thus crown'd 'twould lovelier be,
Were far less vain than to suppose
That silks and gems add grace to thee.
Where is the pearl whose orient lustre...

Oh tell me not of the lands so old
Where the Orient treasures its hills of gold,
And the rivers lie in the sun's bright rays
Forever singing the old world's praise.
Nor proudly boast of the gardens grand...

Champion of those who groan beneath
Oppression's iron hand:
In view of penury, hate, and death,
I see thee fearless stand.
Still bearing up thy lofty brow,
In the steadfast strength of truth,...

Scripta manet.


'Twas graved on the Stone of Destiny,[1]
In letters four and letters three;
And ne'er did the King of the Gulls go by
But those awful letters scared his eye;...

Dear Christians, let us now rejoice,
And dance in joyous measure;
That, of good cheer, and with one voice,
We sing in love and pleasure
Of what to us our God hath shown,...

From heaven high I come to you,
I bring a story good and new:
Of goodly news so much I bring,
Of it I must both speak and sing.

To you a child is come this morn,
A child of chosen maiden born,...

I

Over every hill
All is still;
In no leaf of any tree
Can you see
The motion of a breath.
Every bird has ceased its song,
Wait; and thou too, ere long,
Shall be quiet in death....

X. 48

Woe to the house whose mistress was a slave!
So say old saws, my own in aid I crave;
Woe to the court whose judge once spake for fees,
Though he were readier than Isocrates!...

Poems are painted window-panes:
Look from the square into the church--
Gloom and dusk are all your gains!
Sir Philistine is left in the lurch:
Outside he stands--spies nothing or use of it,...

The grave is deep and soundless,
Its brink is ghastly lone;
With veil all dark and boundless
It hides a land unknown.

The nightingale's sweet closes
Down there come not at all;...

The first Choir.--Lord God, thee praise do we.
The second Choir.--Lord, we give thanks to thee.

1. Thee, Father, eternal God,
2. Earth praises, far and broad.
1. All angels and heaven's host,...

You have two ears--and but one mouth:
Let this, friend, be a token--
Much should be heard, and not so much
Be spoken.

You have two eyes--and but one mouth:
That is an indication--...

A little time, O Love, a little light,
A little hour for ease before the night.
Sweet Love, that art so bitter; foolish Love,
Whom wise men know for wiser, and thy dove...

Two dead men boarded a spectral ship
In the astral Port of Space;
On that ghost-filled barque, they met in the dark,
And halted, face to face.

'Now whither away' - called one of the ghosts,...

Unto my books so good to turn
Far ends of tired days;
It half endears the abstinence,
And pain is missed in praise.

As flavors cheer retarded guests
With banquetings to be,...