Works

[FOR A BIRTHDAY: MAY 20]


On this day to life she came -
May-Rose, my May-Rose!
With scented breeze, with flowered flame,
She touched the earth and took her name
Of May, Rose.
...

Daughter of my nobler hope
That dying gave thee birth,
Sweet Melancholy!
For memory of the dead,
In her dear stead,
'Bide thou with me,
Sweet Melancholy!
As purple shadows to the tree,...

Music is in all growing things;
And underneath the silky wings
Of smallest insects there is stirred
A pulse of air that must be heard.
Earth's silence lives, and throbs, and sings.
...

With my beloved I lingered late one night.
At last the hour when I must leave her came:
But, as I turned, a fear I could not name
Possessed me that the long sweet evening might...

With my beloved I lingered late one night.
At last the hour when I must leave her came:
But, as I turned, a fear I could not name
Possessed me that the long sweet evening might...

Haunted by unknown feet -
Ways of the midnight hour!
Strangely you murmur below me,
Strange is your half-silent power.
Places of life and of death,
Numbered and named as streets,...

O jay -
Blue-jay!
What are you trying to say?
I remember, in the spring
You pretended you could sing;
But your voice is now still queerer,
And as yet you've come no nearer
To a song....

O wholesome Death, thy sombre funeral-car
Looms ever dimly on the lengthening way
Of life; while, lengthening still, in sad array,
My deeds in long procession go, that are...

O Wholesome Death, thy sombre funeral-car
Looms ever dimly on the lengthening way
Of life; while, lengthening still, in sad array,
My deeds in long procession go, that are...

O wayward rose, why dost thou wreathe so high,
Wasting thyself in sweet-breath'd ecstasy?

"The pulses of the wind my life uplift,
And through my sprays I feel the sunlight sift;
...

The sea goes up; the sky comes down.
Oh, can you spy the ancient town, -
The granite hills so hard and gray,
That rib the land behind the bay?
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!...

The sea goes up; the sky comes down.
Oh, can you spy the ancient town, -
The granite hills so green and gray,
That rib the land behind the bay?
O ye ho, boys. Spread her wings!...

Soft-throated South, breathing of summer's ease
(Sweet breath, whereof the violet's life is made!)
Through lips moist-warm, as thou hadst lately stayed
'Mong rosebuds, wooing to the cheeks of these...

Soft-throated South, breathing of summer's ease
(Sweet breath, whereof the violet's life is made!)
Through lips moist-warm, as thou hadst lately stayed
'Mong rosebuds, wooing to the cheeks of these...

Strike hands, young men!
We know not when
Death or disaster comes,
Mightier than battle-drums
To summon us away.
Death bids us say farewell
To all we love, nor stay...

Birds that like vanishing visions go winging,
White, white in the flame of the sunset's burning,
Fly with the wild spray the billows are flinging,
Blend, blend with the nightfall, and fade, unreturning!
...

Valleys lay in sunny vapor,
And a radiance mild was shed
From each tree that like a taper
At a feast stood. Then we said,
"Our feast, too, shall soon be spread,
Of good Thanksgiving turkey."
...

Standing here alone,
Let me pause awhile,
Drinking in the light
Ere, with plunge of white limbs prone,
I raise the sparkling flight
Of foam-flakes volatile.

Now, in natural guise,...

How sweetly sang the bobolink,
When thou, my love, wast nigh!
His liquid music from the brink
Of some cloud-fountain seemed to sink,
Far in the blue-domed sky.

How sadly sings the bobolink!...

How sweetly sang the bobolink,
When thou, my Love, wast nigh!
His liquid music from the brink
Of some cloud-fountain seemed to sink,
Built in the blue-domed sky.

How sadly sings the bobolink!...