Works

My love is tall and handsome;
All hearts she might command;
She's matchless for her beauty,
The queen of all the land.
She has my heart in keeping,
For which there's no repeal,...

It was spring the first time that I saw her, for her papa and mamma moved in
Next door, just as skating was over, and marbles about to begin;...

In the hour of grief and sorrow,
When my heart is full of care,
Seeking sadly hope to borrow
From heaven's promises and prayer;
When around me roll the waters
Of affliction's stormy sea,...

From heaven there fell upon the foaming wave

A timid drop; the flood with anger roared,

But God, its modest boldness to reward,
Strength to the drop and firm endurance gave....

The spring is fresh and fearless
And every leaf is new,
The world is brimmed with moonlight,
The lilac brimmed with dew.

Here in the moving shadows
I catch my breath and sing,...

How sweet it is, when suns get warmly high,
In the mid-noon, as May's first cowslip springs,
And the young cuckoo his soft ditty sings,
To wander out, and take a book; and lie...

'Tis May morning,
All-adorning,
No cloud warning
Of rain to-day.
Where shall I go to,
Go to, go to? -
Can I say No to
Lyonnesse-way?

Well what reason
Now at this season...

I

The grey sea and the long black land;
And the yellow half-moon large and low;
And the startled little waves that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep,
As I gain the cove with pushing prow,...

O meet me to-night by the bright starlight,
Now the pleasant Spring's begun.
My own dear maid, by the greenwood shade,
In the crimson set of the sun,
Meet me to-night.
...

Ye Apennines! with all your fertile vales
Deeply embosomed, and your winding shores
Of either sea an Islander by birth,
A Mountaineer by habit, would resound
Your praise, in meet accordance with your claims...

Those old credulities, to nature dear,
Shall they no longer bloom upon the stock
Of History, stript naked as a rock
'Mid a dry desert? What is it we hear?
The glory of Infant Rome must disappear,...

Long has the dew been dried on tree and lawn:
O'er man and beast a not unwelcome boon
Is shed, the languor of approaching noon;
To shady rest withdrawing or withdrawn...

For action born, existing to be tried,
Powers manifold we have that intervene
To stir the heart that would too closely screen
Her peace from images to pain allied.
What wonder if at midnight, by the side...

When here with Carthage Rome to conflict came,
An earthquake, mingling with the battle's shock,
Checked not its rage; unfelt the ground did rock,
Sword dropped not, javelin kept its deadly aim....

Near Anio's stream, I spied a gentle Dove
Perched on an olive branch, and heard her cooing
'Mid new-born blossoms that soft airs were wooing,
While all things present told of joy and love....

Too frail to keep the lofty vow
That must have followed when his brow
Was wreathed, "The Vision" tells us how
With holly spray,
He faltered, drifted to and fro,
And passed away.
...

What He who, 'mid the kindred throng
Of Heroes that inspired his song,
Doth yet frequent the hill of storms,
The stars dim-twinkling through their forms!
What! Ossian here, a painted Thrall,...

In this still place, remote from men,
Sleeps Ossian, in the NARROW GLEN;
In this still place, where murmurs on
But one meek streamlet, only one:
He sang of battles, and the breath...

What lovelier home could gentle Fancy choose?
Is this the stream, whose cities, heights, and plains,
War's favourite playground, are with crimson stains
Familiar, as the Morn with pearly dews?...

Ambition, following down this far-famed slope
Her Pioneer, the snow-dissolving Sun,
While clarions prate of kingdoms to be won
Perchance, in future ages, here may stop;...