Works

[1]

To M. The Chevalier De Bouillon.[2]

Your taste has served my work to guide;
To gain its suffrage I have tried.
You'd have me shun a care too nice,
Or beauty at too dear a price,...

On summer nights when moonbeams flow
And glisten o'er the high, white tips,
And winds make lamentation low,
As through the ribs of shattered ships,
And steal about the broken brace...

Rising early in the morning,
We proceed to light our fire;
Then our Majesty adorning
In its work-a-day attire,
We embark without delay
On the duties of the day.
...

WORKMAN. Why do you come crawling up to us? What do ye want? You're none of us.... Get along!

MAN WITH WHITE HANDS. I am one of you, comrades!
...

Man's works grow stale to man: the years destroy
The charm they once possessed; the city tires;
The terraces, the domes, the dazzling spires
Are in the main but an attractive toy -...

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!...

(Ballade ' double refrain)

Marshal of France, yet still the Musqueteer,
Comrade at arms, on your bronzed cheek we press
The soldier's kiss, and drop the soldier's tear;...

Old monasteries under steadfast walls
Displayed tableaux of holy Verity,
Warming the inner men in those cold halls
Against the chill of their austerity.
...

They called Thee Merry England, in old time;
A happy people won for thee that name
With envy heard in many a distant clime;
And, spite of change, for me thou keep'st the same...

They know not my heart, who believe there can be
One stain of this earth in its feelings for thee;
Who think, while I see thee in beauty's young hour,
As pure as the morning's first dew on the flower,...

As some day it may happen that a victim must be found,
I've got a little list I've got a little list
Of social offenders who might well be underground,
And who never would be missed who never would be missed!...

They may rail at this life--from the hour I began it,
I found it a life full of kindness and bliss;
And, until they can show me some happier planet,
More social and bright, I'll content me with this....

They met but once, in youth's sweet hour,
And never since that day
Hath absence, time, or grief had power
To chase that dream away.
They've seen the suns of other skies,...

There came a nymph dancing
Gracefully, gracefully,
Her eye a light glancing
Like the blue sea;
And while all this gladness
Around her steps hung,
Such sweet notes of sadness...

I Whispered, 'I am too young,'
And then, 'I am old enough';
Wherefore I threw a penny
To find out if I might love.
'Go and love, go and love, young man,
If the lady be young and fair,'...

The young May moon is beaming, love,
The glow-worm's lamp is gleaming, love,
How sweet to rove
Through Morna's grove,
When the drowsy world is dreaming, love!...

Oh, the joys of our evening posada,
Where, resting, at close of day,
We, young Muleteers of Grenada,
Sit and sing the sunshine away;
So merry, that even the slumbers
That round us hung seem gone;...

YOUTH.

Say, sparkling streamlet, whither thou

Art going!
With joyous mien thy waters now

Are flowing.
Why seek the vale so hastily?
Attend for once, and answer me!
...

We, O Nature, depart:
Thou survivest us: this,
This, I know, is the law.
Yes, but more than this,
Thou who seest us die
Seest us change while we live;
Seest our dreams one by one,...

They tell me thou'rt the favored guest
Of every fair and brilliant throng;
No wit like thine to wake the jest,
No voice like thine to breathe the song;
And none could guess, so gay thou art,...