Works

I.

Oh for a field, my friend; oh for a field!
I ask no more
Than one plain field, shut in by hedgerows four,
Contentment sweet to yield.
For I am not fastidious,...

The clouds are pushing in grey reluctance slowly northward to you,
While north of them all, at the farthest ends, stands one bright-bosomed, aglance...

MADAM,

I read your letter with all that allowance which critical candour could require, but after all find so much to object to, and so much to raise my indignation, that I cannot help giving it a serious answer....

LEGHORN, July 1, 1820.]

The spider spreads her webs, whether she be
In poet's tower, cellar, or barn, or tree;
The silk-worm in the dark green mulberry leaves
His winding sheet and cradle ever weaves;...

I never dreamed we'd meet that day
In our old haunts down Fricourt way,
Plotting such marvellous journeys there
For jolly old "Apr's-la-guerre."

Well, when it's over, first we'll meet...

Let the memorial hill remember instead of me,
that's what it's here for. Let the par in-memory-of remember,
let the street that's-named-for remember,
let the well-known building remember,...

'And if there's blood upon his hand,
'Tis but the blood of deer.'
- W. Scott.


To beasts of the field, and fowls of the air,
And fish of the sea alike,
Man's hand is ever slow to spare,...

Goddess the laughter-loving, Aphrodite, befriend!
Long have I served thine altars, serve me now at the end,
Let me have peace of thee, truce of thee, golden one, send.
...

Light is more important than the lantern,
The poem more important than the notebook,
And the kiss more important than the lips.
My letters to you
Are greater and more important than both of us....

Lightnings may flicker round my head,
And all the world seem doom,
If you, like a wild rose, will walk
Strangely into the room.

If only my sad heart may hear
Your voice of faery laughter -...

"Uncle Jake's Place," St. Jo, Mo., 1874

"I was born in Indiany," says a stranger, lank and slim,
As us fellers in the restarunt was kindo' guyin' him,
And Uncle Jake was slidin' him another punkin pie...

Like mighty footlights burned the red
At bases of the trees, --
The far theatricals of day
Exhibiting to these.

'T was universe that did applaud
While, chiefest of the crowd,...

Like morning, when her early breeze
Breaks up the surface of the seas,
That, in those furrows, dark with night,
Her hand may sow the seeds of light--

Thy Grace can send its breathings o'er...

There's no menagerie, I vow,

Excels my Lily's at this minute;

She keeps the strangest creatures in it,
And catches them, she knows not how.

Oh, how they hop, and run, and rave,...

William was once a bashful youth,
His modesty was such,
That one might say, to say the truth,
He rather had too much.


Some said that it was want of sense,
And others, want of spirit...

Life is before ye - and while now ye stand
Eager to spring upon the promised land,
Fair smiles the way, where yet your feet have trod
But few light steps, upon a flowery sod;...

O Love! the mischief thou hast done!
Thou god of pleasure and of pain!--
None can escape thee--yes there's one--
All others find the effort vain:
Thou cause of all my smiles and tears!...

Wish ye, sons of Alma Mater,
Long lost laurels to replace?
Listen to a stout old Pater,
Once renowned in many a race.
Now, alas! I'm fat and forty,
And my form grows round to view;...

This passion is but an ember
Of a Sun, of a Fire, long set;
I could not live and remember,
And so I love and forget.

You say, and the tone is fretful,
That my mourning days were few,...

Five years have past; five summers, with the length
Of five long winters! and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft inland murmur., Once again...