Works

As I was walkin on the strand,
I spied ane auld man sit
On ane auld black rock; and aye the waves
Cam washin up its fit.
His lips they gaed as gien they wad lilt,
But o' liltin, wae's me, was nane!...

I cannot write old verses here,
Dead things a thousand years away,
When all the life of the young year
Is in the summer day.

The roses make the world so sweet,...

Such guests as you, sir, were not in my mind
When I my homely dish with care designed;
'Twas certain humble souls I would have fed
Who do not turn from wholesome milk and bread:...

I know not what among the grass thou art,
Thy nature, nor thy substance, fairest flower,
Nor what to other eyes thou hast of power
To send thine image through them to the heart;...

WITH THE FOLLOWING POEM.

I walked all night: the darkness did not yield.
Around me fell a mist, a weary rain,
Enduring long. At length the dawn revealed
...

Thus, once, long since, the daring of my youth
Drew nigh thy greatness with a little thing;
And thou didst take me in: thy home of truth

Has domed me since, a heaven of sheltering,...

Seek not my name--it doth no virtue bear;
Seek, seek thine own primeval name to find--
The name God called when thy ideal fair
Arose in deeps of the eternal mind.
...

If I did seem to you no more
Than to myself I seem,
Not thus you would fling wide the door,
And on the beggar beam!

You would not don your radiant best,
Or dole me more than half!...

Go not forth to call Dame Sorrow
From the dim fields of Tomorrow;
Let her roam there all unheeded,
She will come when she is needed;
Then, when she draws near thy door,
She will find God there before.

A fresh young voice that sings to me
So often many a simple thing,
Should surely not unanswered be
By all that I can sing.

Dear voice, be happy every way
A thousand changing tones among,...

Oh, melancholy fragment of the night
Drawing thy lazy web against the sun,
Thou shouldst have waited till the day was done
With kindred glooms to build thy fane aright,
Sublime amid the ruins of the light!...

To God and man be simply true;
Do as thou hast been wont to do;
Bring out thy treasures, old and new--
Mean all the same when said to you.

I love thee: thou art calm and strong;...

To God and man be simply true:
Do as thou hast been wont to do:
Or, Of the old more in the new:
Mean all the same when said to you.

I love thee. Thou art calm and strong;...

A broken tale of endless things,
Take, lady: thou art not of those
Who in what vale a fountain springs
Would have its journey close.

Countless beginnings, fair first parts,...

The sun is sinking in the west,
Long grow the shadows dim;
Have patience, sister, to be blest,
Wait patiently for Him.

Thou knowest love, much love hast had,
Great things of love mayst tell,...

The silence of traitorous feet!
The silence of close-pent rage!
The roar, and the sudden heart-beat!
And the shot through the true heart going,
The truest heart of the age!...

Ah, truant, thou art here again, I see!
For in a season of such wretched weather
I thought that thou hadst left us altogether,
Although I could not choose but fancy thee...

Men sought, ambition's thirst to slake,
The lost elixir old
Whose magic touch should instant make
The meaner metals gold.

A nobler alchymy is thine
Which love from pain doth press:...

My TO-MORROW is but a flitting
Fancy of the brain;
God's TO-MORROW an angel sitting,
Ready for joy or pain.

My TO-MORROW has no soul,
Dead as yesterdays;
God's--a brimming silver bowl...

It is no winter night comes down
Upon our hearts, dear friends of old;
But a May evening, softly brown,
Whose wind is rather cold.

We are not, like yon sad-eyed West,...