Works

I

Who would be
A merman gay,
Singing alone,
Sitting alone,
With a mermaid's knee,
For instance - hey -
For a throne?

II

I would be a merman gay;...

I.
Who would be
A merman bold,
Sitting alone,
Singing alone
Under the sea,
With a crown of gold,
On a throne?

II.
I would be a merman bold,...

'The Indians speak of a beautiful river, far to the south,
which they call Merrimac.' - SIEUR. DE MONTS, 1604.


Stream of my fathers! sweetly still
The sunset rays thy valley fill;...

Oh, I am grown so free from care
Since my heart broke!
I set my throat against the air,
I laugh at simple folk!

There's little kind and little fair
Is worth its weight in smoke...

[HE] I have a song to sing, O!
[SHE] Sing me your song, O!
[HE] It is sung to the moon
By a love-lorn loon,
Who fled from the mocking throng, O!
It's the song of a merryman, moping mum,...

(From Heine)

Up, dear laddie, saddle quick,
And spring upon the leather!
Away post haste o'er fell and waste
With whip and spur together!

And when you win to Duncan's kin...

I have not the gift of vision,
I have not the psychic ear,
And the realms that are called Elysian
I neither see nor hear;
Yet oft when the shadows darken
And the daylight hides its face,...

My Marjorie doth hold in her white hands
A spray of lilies plucked below the brook
Where the old ruin of a chapel stands -
A ruin tenanted by many a nook,
And all the grayness of it hid from sight...

Fair now is the springtide, now earth lies beholding
With the eyes of a lover the face of the sun;
Long lasteth the daylight, and hope is enfolding
The green-growing acres with increase begun.
...

Fair now is the springtide, now earth lies beholding
With the eyes of a lover, the face of the sun;
Long lasteth the daylight, and hope is enfolding
The green-growing acres with increase begun.
...

She rose up in the early dawn,
And white and silently she moved
About the house. Four men had gone
To battle for the land they loved,
And she, the mother and the wife,...

Is his form hidden by some cliff or crag,
Or does he loiter on the shelving shore?
We know not, though we know he waits for us,
Somewhere upon the road that lies before.
...

Religion 'twas produced this poem's fire;
Perverted also? prithee, don't inquire!

Ye nymphs of Solyma! begin the song,
To heavenly themes sublimer strains belong.
The mossy fountains, and the sylvan shades,
The dreams of Pindus, and the Aonian maids,...

The fairy beam upon you,
The stars to glister on you;
A moon of light
In the noon of night,
Till the fire-drake hath o'er gone you.
The wheel of fortune guide you
The boy with the bow beside you;...

Twisting and writhing like a snake on fiery sands,
Kneading her breast against her corset's metal bands,
The woman, meanwhile, from her mouth of strawberry
Let flow these fragrant words of musky mystery:...

Thou art confused, my beloved, at, seeing the thousandfold union

Shown in this flowery troop, over the garden dispers'd;
any a name dost thou hear assign'd; one after another
...

"How far beneath me seems the earthly ball!
The pigmy race below I scarce can see;
How does my art, the noblest art of all,
Bear me close up to heaven's bright canopy!"...

Nothing, search all creation round,
Nothing so firmly good is found,
Whose substance, with such closeness knit,
Corruption's Touch will not admit;
But, spite of all incroaching stains,...

We walked together in the dusk
To watch the tower grow dimly white,
And saw it lift against the sky
Its flower of amber light.

You talked of half a hundred things,...