Works

When one who has wandered out of the way
Which leads to the hills of joy,
Whose heart has grown both cold and grey,
Though it be but the heart of a boy--
When such a one turns back his feet...

'When I shall be divorced, some ten years hence,
From this poor present self which I am now;
When youth has done its tedious vain expense
Of passions that for ever ebb and flow;...

(TO OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES)


Strange spell of youth for age, and age for youth,
Affinity between two forms of truth! -
As if the dawn and sunset watched each other,...

You were the sort that men forget;
Though I - not yet! -
Perhaps not ever. Your slighted weakness
Adds to the strength of my regret!

You'd not the art - you never had
For good or bad -...

My life In front of you on the ground
Will fall as a broken flower.
You will go past, caught by rain,
Hurrying into the cosy, warm house.
You will forget how under the hot sun...

You will forget me. The years are so tender,
They bind up the wounds which we think are so deep;
This dream of our youth will fade out as the splendor
Fades from the skies when the sun sinks to sleep;...

You will hear thunder and remember me,
And think: she wanted storms. The rim
Of the sky will be the colour of hard crimson,
And your heart, as it was then, will be on fire.
...

The green has come to the leafless tree,
The earth brings forth its grain;
The flower has come for the honey bee:
You will not come again.

The birds have come to the empty nest,...

[From Arthur Selwyn's Note-book.]

Let me a moment indite
Scenes that I witnessed one night:


["You Will Tell Me Where Is Conrad?"]
...

You wrong me, Kate, you wrong me
In harbouring the thought
That he who loves so fondly
Would injure thee in aught.
The pang that I must feel, Kate,
When dark suspicion lurks...

Behold! it was night; and the wind and the rushing of snow on the wind,
And the boom of the sea and the moaning of desolate pines that were thinned.
...

In your mother's apple-orchard,
Just a year ago, last spring:
Do you remember, Yvonne!
The dear trees lavishing
Rain of their starry blossoms
To make you a coronet?
Do you ever remember, Yvonne?...

Where wail the waters in their flaw
A spectre wanders to and fro,
And evermore that ghostly shore
Bemoans the heir of Yvytot.

Sometimes, when, like a fleecy pall,
The mists upon the waters fall,...

To whom the heavy burden clings,
It yet may serve him like a staff;
One day the cross will break in wings,
The sinner laugh a holy laugh.

The dwarfed Zacchaeus climbed a tree,...

Jesus entered and passed through Jericho. Luke 19:1-10.


City of palms! whose ancient name
Suggests a line of scarlet hue,
Type of thy glorious Guest who came...

("Sara, belle d'indolence.")

[XIX., August, 1828.]


In a swinging hammock lying,
Lightly flying,
Zara, lovely indolent,
O'er a fountain's crystal wave
There to lave...

I'll do my best to win whene'er I woo:
That man loves not who is not zealous too.

From the mystic sidereal spaces,
In the noon of a night 'mid of May,
Came a spirit that murmured to me --
Or was it the dream of a dream?
No! no! from the purest of places,...

I was sixteen, and I had the most terrible dreams,
And specks before my eyes, and nervous weakness.
And I couldn't remember the books I read,
Like Frank Drummer who memorized page after page....

Wheresoever thou wanderest in space, thy Zenith and Nadir
Unto the heavens knit thee, unto the axis of earth.
Howsoever thou attest, let heaven be moved by thy purpose,...