Works

Flower in the crannied wall,
I pluck you out of the crannies,
I hold you here, root and all, in my hand,
Little flower'but if I could understand
What you are, root and all, and all in all,...

Painted Upon a Porte Livre.


How strange to greet, this frosty morn,
In graceful counterfeit of flowers,
These children of the meadows, born
Of sunshine and of showers!
...

He. Ah, the bird-like fluting
Through the ash-tops yonder,
Bullfinch-bubblings, soft sounds suiting
What sweet thoughts, I wonder?
Fine-pearled notes that surely
Gather, dewdrop-fashion,...

The splendor of the kindling day,
The splendor of the setting sun,
These move my soul to wend its way,
And have done
With all we grasp and toil amongst and say.

The paling roses of a cloud,...

Seems lak folks is mighty curus
In de way dey t'inks an' ac's.
Dey jes' spen's dey days a-mixin'
Up de t'ings in almanacs.
Now, I min' my nex' do' neighbour,--
He's a mighty likely man,...

For all we have and are,
For all our children's fate,
Stand up and take the war.
The Hun is at the gate!
Our world has passed away,
In wantonness o'erthrown.
There is nothing left to-day...

Such was old Chaucer. such the placid mien
Of him who first with harmony inform'd
The language of our fathers. Here he dwelt
For many a cheerful day. these ancient walls...

(Suggested Inscription probably not selected by the Committee.)


The hucksters haggle in the mart
The cars and carts go by;
Senates and schools go droning on;
For dead things cannot die.
...

The day is fading, yet I still stand
With a heavy heart and silent thought
And gaze upon the forest wall
That rises up around me naught.
Perhaps the partisans have lit
A bonfire in the evening air...

In the first rare spring of song,
In my heart's young hours,
In my youth 't was thus I sang,
Choosing 'mid the flowers: -

"Fair the Dandelion is,
But for me too lowly;
And the winsome Violet...

They cheered him from the wharf, it was a glorious day:
His hand went to his scarf, his thoughts were far away.
Oh, he was 'Jolly Good', they sang it long and loud,...

They were a couple well content
With what they earned and what they spent,
Cared not a whit for style's decree -
For he was Scotch, and so was she.

And oh, they loved to talk of Burns -...

"For myself alone, I would not be
Ambitious in my wish; but, for you,
I would be trebled twenty times myself;
A thousand times more fair,
Ten thousand times more rich."

Dear friends, we are strangers; we never before
Have suspected what love to each other we bore;
But each of us all to his neighbor is dear,
Whose heart has a throb for our time-honored pier.
...

1630

All overgrown with bush and fern,
And straggling clumps of tangled trees,
With trunks that lean and boughs that turn,
Bent eastward by the mastering breeze, -...

The world is a snob, and the man who wins
Is the chap for its money's worth:
And the lust for success causes half of the sins
That are cursing this brave old earth....

Feed my lambs! the Saviour said,
Near two thousand years ago;
If we truly love the Lord,
By obedience, love we'll show.

What was said to Peter then,
In that distant age and clime,...

Afar he sleeps whose name is graven here,
Where loving hearts his early doom deplore;
Youth, promise, virtue, all that made him dear
Heaven lent, earth borrowed, sorrowing to restore.
...

(See Note 51)

A still procession goes
Amid the battle's booming,
Its arm the red cross shows;
It prays in many forms of speech,
And, bending o'er the fallen,
Brings peace and home to each....

Forth from a jutting ridge, around whose base
Winds our deep Vale, two heath-clad Rocks ascend
In fellowship, the loftiest of the pair
Rising to no ambitious height; yet both,...