Works

"But if any old Lady, Knight, Priest, or Physician,
Should condemn me for printing a second edition;
If good Madam Squintum my work should abuse,
May I venture to give her a smack of my muse?"
...

Anthea laugh'd, and, fearing lest excess
Might stretch the cords of civil comeliness
She with a dainty blush rebuked her face,
And call'd each line back to his rule and space.

As I stand waiting in the rain
For the foggy hoot of the London train,
Gazing at silent wall and lamp
And post and rail and platform damp,
What is this power that comes to my sight...

Sometimes I think 'at Parents does
Things ist about as bad as us -


Wite 'fore our vurry eyes, at that!
Fer one time Pa he scold' my Ma
'Cause he can't find his hat;...

If yet your thoughts are loose from state affairs,
Nor feel the burden of a kingdom's cares;
If yet your time and actions are your own;
Receive the present of a Muse unknown:...

No more: the end is sudden and abrupt,
Abrupt, as without preconceived design
Was the beginning; yet the several Lays
Have moved in order, to each other bound
By a continuous and acknowledged tie...

I know a pool, whose crystalline repose
Sleeps under walls of granite, whence the pine
Leans looking at its image, line for line
Repeated with the sumach and wild-rose...

S' avvien che spesso.


What though strong love of life doth flatter me
With hope of yet more years on earth to stay,
Death none the less draws nearer day by day,...

Parmi che spesso.


Ofttimes my great desire doth flatter me
With hope on earth yet many years to stay:
Still Death, the more I love it, day by day
Takes from the life I love so tenderly....

Perch' tuo gran bellezze.


That thy great beauty on our earth may be
Shrined in a lady softer and more kind,
I call on nature to collect and bind
All those delights the slow years steal from thee,...

Sol perch' tue bellezze.


If only that thy beauties here may be
Deathless through Time that rends the wreaths he twined,
I trust that Nature will collect and bind...

'O mes cheres Mille et Une Nuits!' - Fantasio.

Once on a time
There was a little boy: a master-mage
By virtue of a Book
Of magic - O, so magical it filled
His life with visionary pomps...

Who knows it not, who loves it not,
The long and steady swing,
The instant dip, the iron grip,
The rowlocks' linked ring,
The arrowy sway of hands away,
The slider oiling aft,...

The beauty of this rainy day,
All silver-green and dripping gray,
Has stolen quite my heart away
From all the tasks I meant to do,
Made me forget the resolute blue
And energetic gold of things . . ....

Oh, what a blessed interval
A rainy day may be!
No lightning flash nor tempest roar,
But one incessant, steady pour
Of dripping melody;
When from their sheltering retreat
Go not with voluntary feet...

When the clouds shake their hyssops, and the rain
Like holy water falls upon the plain,
'Tis sweet to gaze upon the springing grain
And see your harvest born.

And sweet the little breeze of melody...

Oh, children of the tropics,
Amid our pain and wrong
Have you no other mission
Than music, dance, and song?

When through the weary ages
Our dripping tears still fall,
Is this a time to dally...

Much wine had passed, with grave discourse
Of who f*cks who, and who does worse
(Such as you usually do hear
From those that diet at the Bear),
When I, who still take care to see...

When the gusts are at play with the trees on the lawn,
And the lights are put out in the vault of the night;
When within all is snug, for the curtains are drawn,
And the fire is aglow and the lamps are alight,...

On his death-bed poor Lubin lies:
His spouse is in despair;
With frequent cries, and mutual sighs,
They both express their care.

"A different cause," says Parson Sly,
"The same effect may give:...