Works

I

My Paistin Finn is my sole desire,
And I am shrunken to skin and bone,
For all my heart has had for its hire
Is what I can whistle alone and alone.
i(Oro, oro.!)...

I.

Fame, like a wayward girl, will still be coy
To those who woo her with too slavish knees,
But makes surrender to some thoughtless boy,
And dotes the more upon a heart at ease;...

Doomed to decay are all things here;
Whate'er their form or worth,
Color and beauty disappear,
Or turn to mother earth.

The luscious fruits which please the taste
And please the eye as well,...

Like drifts of balm from cedared glens, those darling memories come,
With soft low songs, and dear old tales, familiar to our home.
Then breathe again that faint refrain, so tender, sad, and true,...

Unfolded out of the folds of the woman, man comes unfolded, and is always to come unfolded;
Unfolded only out of the superbest woman of the earth, is to come the superbest man of the earth;...

And because a man is human
He'll want to eat, and thanks a lot
But talk can't take the place of meat
or fill an empty pot.

So left, two, three!
So left, two, three!...

They sit in silence. In camera, around the table. Terrifyingly stern, stares that grew antlers in my eyes.

It was as if thunder or bolts with electricity were being decreed....

A golden fly one show'd to me,
Clos'd in a box of ivory,
Where both seem'd proud: the fly to have
His burial in an ivory grave;
The ivory took state to hold
A corpse as bright as burnish'd gold....

You say you'll kiss me, and I thank you for it;
But stinking breath, I do as hell abhor it.

Twice has Pudica been a bride, and led
By holy Hymen to the nuptial bed.
Two youths she's known thrice two, and twice three years;
Yet not a lily from the bed appears:...

'Tis heresy in others: in your face
That scar's no schism, but the sign of grace.

Center is known weak-sighted, and he sells
To others store of helpful spectacles.
Why wears he none? Because we may suppose,
Where leaven wants, there level lies the nose.

We read how Faunus, he the shepherds' god,
His wife to death whipped with a myrtle rod.
The rod, perhaps, was better'd by the name;
But had it been of birch, the death's the same.

Why walks Nick Flimsey like a malcontent!
Is it because his money all is spent?
No, but because the dingthrift now is poor,
And knows not where i' th' world to borrow more.

Flood, if he has for him and his a bit,
He says his fore and after grace for it:
If meat he wants, then grace he says to see
His hungry belly borne on legs jail-free....

Fone says, those mighty whiskers he does wear
Are twigs of birch, and willow, growing there:
If so, we'll think too, when he does condemn
Boys to the lash, that he does whip with them.

Franck ne'er wore silk she swears; but I reply,
She now wears silk to hide her blood-shot eye.

When as abroad, to greet the morn,
I mark my Graciosa walk,
In homage bends the whisp'ring corn,
Yet to confess
Its awkwardness
Must hang its head upon the stalk.
...

Her pretty feet
Like snails did creep
A little out, and then,
As if they played at Bo-peep,
Did soon draw in again.

I begin to wane in sight;
Shortly I shall bid good-night:
Then no gazing more about,
When the tapers once are out.