Works

There are two stars in yonder steeps
That watch the baby while he sleeps.
But while the baby is awake
And singing gayly all day long,
The little stars their slumbers take...

All things grew upwards, foul and fair:
The great trees fought and beat the air
With monstrous wings that would have flown;
But the old earth clung to her own,
Holding them back from heavenly wars,...

On Hounslow Heath - and close beside the road,
As western travellers may oft have seen, -
A little house some years ago there stood,
A minikin abode;
And built like Mr. Birkbeck's, all of wood:...

"On court, h'las! apr's la v'rit';
Ah! croyez-moi, l'erreur a son m'rite."
Voltaire.


Curled in a maze of dolls and bricks,
I find Miss Mary, 'tat six,
Blonde, blue-eyed, frank, capricious,...

Let no one say of Christ's Church, "Ichabod,"
Or deem her strength partaker of decay,
Or think her trumpet voices fail. To-day
I saw a man who was a man of God,
His feet with gospel preparation shod,...

Nevermore at doorways that are barken
Shall the madcap wind knock and the moonlight;
Nor the circle which thou once didst darken,
Shine with footsteps of the neighbouring moonlight,...

When Death has crossed my name from out the roll
Of dreaming children serving in this War;
And with these earthly eyes I gaze no more
Upon sweet England's grace - perhaps my soul...

To * * Esq. of * * with a Life of the late Ingenious Mr. W M. Hogarth.


Dear Cosmopolitan,--I know
I should address you a Rondeau,
Or else announce what I've to say
At least en Ballade fratris'e;...

Yes, write, if you want to, there's nothing like trying;
Who knows what a treasure your casket may hold?
I'll show you that rhyming's as easy as lying,
If you'll listen to me while the art I unfold.
...

WOODSTOCK, CONN., JULY 4, 1877

Not to myself this breath of vesper song,
Not to these patient friends, this kindly throng,
Not to this hallowed morning, though it be...

The world of dreams is all my own,
Wherein I wander - free, alone; -
And each weird, fervid fantasy
Is dearer than earth's joys to me.
The waking world I share with you;...

"De m'moires de Roses on n'a point vu mourir le Jardinier."


The Rose in the garden slipped her bud,
And she laughed in the pride of her youthful blood,
As she thought of the Gardener standing by--...

This freakish ghost has nothing else to wear
But some cheap crown he picked up at a fair
Grotesquely perched atop his bony corpse.
Without a whip or spur he drives his horse
Ghostly as he, hack of apocalypse...

A fantasy that came to me
As wild and wantonly designed
As ever any dream might be
Unraveled from a madman's mind, -
A tangle-work of tissue, wrought
By cunning of the spider-brain,...

Her voice is like clear water
That drips upon a stone
In forests far and silent
Where Quiet plays alone.

Her thoughts are like the lotus
Abloom by sacred streams
Beneath the temple arches...

From Australia.

Oh, tell me, God of Battles! Oh, say what is to come!
The King is in his trenches, the millionaire at home;
The Kaiser with his toiling troops, the Czar is at the front....

Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea,
Thy tribute wave deliver:
No more by thee my steps shall be,
For ever and for ever.

Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea,
A rivulet then a river:...

My Horse's feet beside the lake,
Where sweet the unbroken moonbeams lay,
Sent echoes through the night to wake,
Each glistening strand, each heath-fringed bay.

The poplar avenue was pass'd,...

Down the steep west unrolled,
I watch the river of the sunset flow,
With all its crimson lights, and gleaming gold,
Into the dusk below.

And even as I gaze,...

Oft have I mused, but now at length I find
Why those that die, men say, they do depart:
Depart: a word so gentle to my mind,
Weakly did seem to paint Death's ugly dart.
...