Works

As my little pot doth boil,
We will keep this level-coil,
That a wave and I will bring
To my God a heave-offering.

Gold I have none, but I present my need,
O Thou, that crown'st the will, where wants the deed.
Where rams are wanting, or large bullocks' thighs,
There a poor lamb's a plenteous sacrifice....

What though my harp and viol be
Both hung upon the willow tree?
What though my bed be now my grave,
And for my house I darkness have?
What though my healthful days are fled,...

Thou, by whom, freed from rules constrained and wrong,
On truth and nature once again we're placed,
Who, in the cradle e'en a hero strong,
Stiffest the serpents round our genius laced,...

When one is forty years and seven,
Is seven and forty sad years old,
He looks not onward for his Heaven,
The future is too blank and cold,
Its pale flowers smell of graveyard mould;...

To hang our head ostensibly,
And subsequent to find
That such was not the posture
Of our immortal mind,

Affords the sly presumption
That, in so dense a fuzz,
You, too, take cobweb attitudes...

Spirit girl to whom 'twas given
To revisit scenes of pain,
From the hell I thought was Heaven
You have lifted me again;
Through the world that I inherit,
Where I loved her ere she died,...

(See Note 53)

We welcome you this wondrous summer-day,
When childhood's dreams on earth are streaming,
To bloom and sing, to brighten and to pale;
A fairy-tale,...

1.

Harriet! to see such Circumspection, [2]
In Ladies I have no objection
Concerning what they read;
An ancient Maid's a sage adviser,
Like her, you will be much the wiser,...

Thy look of love has power to calm
The stormiest passion of my soul;
Thy gentle words are drops of balm
In life's too bitter bowl;
No grief is mine, but that alone
These choicest blessings I have known....

SIX YEARS OLD

O thou! whose fancies from afar are brought;
Who of thy words dost make a mock apparel,
And fittest to unutterable thought
The breeze-like motion and the self-born carol;...

Hail, soothing balm! Ye breezes blow,
Ransack the flower and blossom'd tree;
All, all your stolen gifts bestow,
For Health has granted all to me.

And may this blessing long be mine,...

To hear her sing - to hear her sing -
It is to hear the birds of Spring
In dewy groves on blooming sprays
Pour out their blithest roundelays.

It is to hear the robin trill...

Good, and great God, can I not think of thee,
But it must, straight, my melancholy bee?
Is it interpreted in mee disease,
That, laden with my sinnes. I seeke for ease?...

Open thy gates
To him who weeping waits,
And might come in,
But that held back by sin.
Let mercy be
So kind, to set me free,
And I will straight
Come in, or force the gate.

Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicean barks of yore,
That gently, o'er a perfumed sea,
The weary, wayworn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,...

I saw thee once--once only--years ago:
I must not say how many--but not many.
It was a July midnight; and from out
A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,...

Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicean barks of yore,
That gently, o'er a perfumed sea,
The weary, wayworn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,...

Nay, lady, one frown is enough
In a life as soon over as this,
And though minutes seem long in a huff,
They're minutes 'tis pity to miss!
The smiles you imprison so lightly...

To help our bleaker parts
Salubrious hours are given,
Which if they do not fit for earth
Drill silently for heaven.