Works

The fairy woman maketh moan,
"Well-a-day, and well-a-day,
Forsooth I brought thee one rose, one,
And thou didst cast my rose away."
Hark! Oh hark, she mourneth yet,...

The greenhouse is my summer seat;
My shrubs displaced from that retreat
Enjoy'd the open air;
Two goldfinches, whose sprightly song
Had been their mutual solace long,
Lived happy prisoners there.
...

All beauty is but thee in echo-shapes,
No lovely thing but echoes some of thee,
Vainly some touch of thy perfection apes,
Sighing as fair as thou thyself to be;
Therefore, be not disquieted that I...

There was a wooer blithe and gay,

A son of France was he,
Who in his arms for many a day,

As though his bride were she,
A poor young maiden had caress'd,...

Thanks to Memory's daughters nine,
Animals have graced my line:
Higher heroes in my story
Might have won me less of glory.
Wolves, in language of the sky,
Talk with dogs throughout my verse;...

I

O Life, dear Life, in this fair house
Long since did I, it seems to me,
In some mysterious doleful way
Fall out of love with thee.

For, Life, thou art become a ghost,...

Too tall our structures, and too swift our pace;
Not so we mount, not so we gain the race.
Too loud the voice of commerce in the land;
Not so truth speaks, not so we understand....

The Lawns were dry in Euston Park;
(Here Truth [1] inspires my Tale)
The lonely footpath, still and dark,
Led over Hill and Dale.
...

I RECOLLECT, that lately much I blamed,
The sort of lover, avaricious named;
And if in opposites we reason see,
The liberal in paradise should be.
The rule is just and, with the warmest zeal,...

[1]

You often hear a sweet seductive call:
If wise, you haste towards it not at all; -
And, if you heed my apologue,
You act like John de Nivelle's dog.[2]

A capon, citizen of Mans,...

From that warm height and pure,
The peak undreamed of out of heavy air
Rising to heaven more strange and rare;
From that amazed brief sojourn, exquisite, insecure;

Fallen from thence to this,...

"Down, down, down, ten thousand fathoms deep."
Count Fathom.


Who does not know that dreadful gulf, where Niagara falls,
Where eagle unto eagle screams, to vulture vulture calls;...

From Cypress and from laurel boughs
Are twined, in sorrow and in pride,
The leaves that deck the mouldering brows
Of those who for their country died:
In sorrow, that the sable pall...

Old elm, that murmured in our chimney top
The sweetest anthem autumn ever made
And into mellow whispering calms would drop
When showers fell on thy many coloured shade...

Autumn is over the long leaves that love us,
And over the mice in the barley sheaves;
Yellow the leaves of the rowan above us,
And yellow the wet wild-strawberry leaves....

Above the din of commerce, above the clamour and rattle
Of labour disputing with riches, of Anarchists' threats and groans,
Above the hurry and hustle and roar of that bloodless battle,...

'Twas on a day
When the immortals at their banquet lay;
The bowl
Sparkled with starry dew,
The weeping of those myriad urns of light,
Within whose orbs, the Almighty Power,...

Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Thou art low! thou mighty one,
How is the brilliance of thy diadem,
How is the lustre of thy throne
Rent from thee, and thy sun of fame
Darken'd by the shadowy pinion...

The sunset on Judah's high places grew pale,
And purple tints shadowed the gorge and the vale,
While Venus in beauty, with dilating eye,
Out-riding the star-host, looked down from the sky...

This fell when dinner-time was done
'Twixt the first an' the second rub
That oor mon Jock cam' hame again
To his rooms ahint the Club.

An' syne he laughed, an' syne he sang,...