Works

If you fancy that your people came of better stock than mine,
If you hint of higher breeding by a word or by a sign,
If you're proud because of fortune or the clever things you do,...

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
"Life is but an empty dream!"
For the soul is dead that slumbers.
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!...

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!...

I

There is a house with ivied walls,
And mullioned windows worn and old,
And the long dwellers in those halls
Have souls that know but sordid calls,
And daily dote on gold.

II
...

The, Gods that are wiser than Learning
But kinder than Life have made sure
No mortal may boast in the morning
That even will find him secure.
With naught for fresh faith or new trial,...

Are you the new person drawn toward me?
To begin with, take warning--I am surely far different from what you suppose;
Do you suppose you will find in me your ideal?...

The years go by, but they little seem
Like those within our dream;
The years that stood in such luring guise,
Beckoning us into Paradise,
To jailers turn as time goes by...

It was long and long ago our love began;
It is something all unmeasured by time's span:
In an era and a spot, by the Modern World forgot,
We were lovers, ere God named us, Maid and Man.
...

Young Croesus went to pay his call
On Colonel Sawbones, Caxton Hall:
And, though his wound was healed and mended,
He hoped he'd get his leave extended.

The waiting-room was dark and bare....

Of their great names I may record but few;
He who beholds the Ocean white with sails
And copies each confuses all the view,
He paints too much - and fails.

His picture shows no high, emphatic light,...

O'er town, and works, and waves amain
Far fell grim Ruin's furious rain,
O'er parapet and mast,
And riding on the thunder-swell
Far flew the shot, far flew the shell
Red Havoc on the blast!...

Superb in white and red, and white and gold,
And white and violet, the French unfold
Their blazoned banners on the Autumn air,
While cymbols clash and brazen trumpets blare:...

Achilles came from Homer's Jove-like brain,
Pavilioned 'mid his ships where Thetis trod;
But he whose image dominates this plain
Came from the hand of God!

Yet, of his life, which shall all time adorn...

Full-burnished through the long-revolving years
The ploughshare of a Century to-day
Runs peaceful furrows where a crop of Spears
Once stood in War's array.

And we, like those who on the Trojan plain...

On the night air there floating comes, hoarse, war-like, low and deep,
A sound as tho' the dreaming drums were talking in their sleep.

"Fall in! Fall in!" The stormers form, in silence, stern and grim,...

And here France came one hundred years ago!
Red, russet, purple glowed upon the trees,
And sunset glories deepened in their glow
Along the painted seas.

A wealth of color blazed on land and wave,...

Brave was the foeman! well he held his ground!
But here defeat at kindred hands he found!
The shafts rained on him, in a righteous cause,
Came from the quiver of Old England's laws!
...

As some spent gladiator, struck by Death,
Whose reeling vision scarce a foe defines,
For one last effort gathers all his breath,
England draws in her lines.
...

Behind the town the sun sinks down
Gilding the vane upon the spire,
While many a wall reels to its fall
Beneath the fell artillery fire.

As sinks that sun mortar and gun...

The fountain of our story spreads no clouds
Of mist above it rich in varied glows,
None paint us Gods and Goddesses in crowds
Where some Scamander flows.

The tale of Jamestown, which I need not gild,...