Works

Is it so far from thee
Thou canst no longer see,
In the Chamber over the Gate,
That old man desolate,
Weeping and wailing sore
For his son, who is no more?
O Absalom, my son!
...

As the Chameleon, who is known
To have no colours of his own,
But borrows from his neighbour's hue
His white or black, his green or blue,
And struts as much in ready light,...

I mind as 'ow the night afore that show
Us five got talking,--we was in the know,
"Over the top to-morrer; boys, we're for it,
First wave we are, first ruddy wave; that's tore it."...

Love used to carry a bow, you know,
But now he carries a taper;
It is either a length of wax aglow,
Or a twist of lighted paper.

I pondered a little about the scamp,
And then I decided to follow...

Out of the past there rises a week -
Who shall read the years O! -
Out of the past there rises a week
Enringed with a purple zone.
Out of the past there rises a week...

The change has come, and Helen sleeps--
Not sleeps; but wakes to greater deeps
Of wisdom, glory, truth, and light,
Than ever blessed her seeking sight,
In this low, long, lethargic night,...

"Ahoy, and ahoy!"
'Twixt mocking and merry -
"Ahoy and ahoy, there,
Young man of the ferry!"
She stood on the steps
In the watery gloom -
That Changeling - "Ahoy, there!"...

I

There were Fa'ries two or three,
And a high moon white as wool,
Or a bloom in Fa'ry,
Where the star-thick blossoms be
Star-like beautiful.


II
...

For the fairest maid in Hampton
They needed not to search,
Who saw young Anna favor
Come walking into church,

Or bringing from the meadows,
At set of harvest-day,...

Or ever the battered liners sank
With their passengers to the dark,
I was head of a Walworth Bank,
And you were a grocer's clerk.

I was a dealer in stocks and shares,
And you in butters and teas;...

Be not proud, but now incline
Your soft ear to discipline;
You have changes in your life,
Sometimes peace, and sometimes strife;
You have ebbs of face and flows,
As your health or comes or goes;...

Would you hear a wild tale of adventure
Of a hero who tackled the sea,
A super-man swimming the ocean,
Then hark to the tale of Joe Lee.

Our Channel, our own Straits of Dover...

Not for less love, all glorious France, to thee,
'Sweet enemy' called in days long since at end.
Now found and hailed of England sweeter friend,
Bright sister of our freedom now, being free;...

I bear dis cross dis many a mile.
O de cross-bearin' chile -
De cross-bearin' chile!

I bear dis cross 'long many a road
Wha' de pink ain't bloom' an' de grass done mowed....

SIR OZANA LE CURE HARDY. SIR GALAHAD. SIR BORS DE GANYS.

SIR OZANA.

All day long and every day,
From Christmas-Eve to Whit-Sunday,
Within that Chapel-aisle I lay,
And no man came a-near....

I do believe, and yet, in grief,
I pray for help to unbelief;
For needful strength aside to lay
The daily cumberings of my way.

I'm sick at heart of craft and cant,...

I've been thinking it through, as I play here to-night, to play never again,
By the light of that lowering sun peering in at the window-pane,
And over the back-street roofs, throwing shades from the boys of the chore...

A parish priest was of the pilgrim train;
An awful, reverend, and religious man.
His eyes diffused a venerable grace,
And charity itself was in his face.
Rich was his soul, though his attire was poor;...

Deep in a valley, green with ancient beech,
And wandered through of one small, silent stream,
Whose bear-grassed banks bristled with brush and burr,
Tick-trefoil and the thorny marigold,...

Once a charcoal wagon passed,
And an old black charcoalman,
"Blacker than a midnight blast,"
Mother said. And he began
Crying, "Charcoal! charcoal!
Come and buy my charcoal."...