Works

The frost has settled down upon the trees
And ruthlessly strangled off the fantasies
Of leaves that have gone unnoticed, swept like old
Romantic stories now no more to be told.
...

Like the vulture
Who on heavy morning clouds
With gentle wing reposing
Looks for his prey,
Hover, my song!

For a God hath
Unto each prescribed
His destined path,
Which the happy one...

Glad winters on the olden farm!
How raptures from those early times
Commingle into fairy chimes
Which gently banish cries of harm!
My fainting soul finds rest the whiles
Within the arms of memory,...

Lycidas

Thyrsis, the music of that murm'ring spring,
Is not so mournful as the strains you sing.
Nor rivers winding thro' the vales below,
So sweetly warble, or so smoothly flow....

Spirit of unwearied wing,
From the Baltic's frozen main,
From the Russ's bleak domain,
Say, what tidings dost thou bring!
Shouts, and the noise of battle! and again...

The wind-swayed daisies, that on every side
Throng the wide fields in whispering companies,
Serene and gently smiling like the eyes
Of tender children long beatified,...

Win' that blaws the simmer plaid
Ower the hie hill's shoothers laid,
Green wi' gerse, an' reid wi' heather--
Welcome wi' yer sowl-like weather!
Mony a win' there has been sent
Oot aneth the firmament--...

My son, if you go to the races to battle with Ikey and Mo,
Remember, it's seldom the pigeon can pick out the eye of the crow;
Remember, they live by the business; remember, my son, and go slow.
...

We have no wine here to regale us
So let our tears serve as wine!
Let’s pour. This drink we have in surplus,
Our hearts it’ll burn right through with brine.
Perhaps its bitterness will succour...

I saw Lord Buddha towering by my gate
Saying: "Once more, good youth, I stand and wait."
Saying: "I bring you my fair Law of Peace
And from your withering passion full release;...

Ariel to Miranda: - Take
This slave of Music, for the sake
Of him who is the slave of thee,
And teach it all the harmony
In which thou canst, and only thou,
Make the delighted spirit glow,...

With all thy gifts, America,
(Standing secure, rapidly tending, overlooking the world,)
Power, wealth, extent, vouchsafed to thee, With these, and like of these, vouchsafed to thee,...

Fairer than we the woods of May,
Yet sweeter blossoms do not grow
Than these we send you from our snow,
Cramped are their stems by winter's cold,
And stained their leaves with last year's mould;...

South and far south below the Line,
Our Admiral leads us on,
Above, undreamed-of planets shine,
The stars we know are gone.
Around, our clustered seamen mark
The silent deep ablaze...

The Boers were down on Kimberley with siege and Maxim gun;
The Boers were down on Kimberley, their numbers ten to one!
Faint were the hopes the British had to make the struggle good,...

The Boers were down on Kimberley with siege and Maxim gun;
The Boers were down on Kimberley, their numbers ten to one!
Faint were the hopes the British had to make the struggle good,...

With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the sky,
"How silently, and with how wan a face!"
Where art thou? Thou so often seen on high
Running among the clouds a Wood-nymph's race!...

L. M. C.

We sat together, last May-day, and talked
Of the dear friends who walked
Beside us, sharers of the hopes and fears
Of five and forty years,
...

(Lyra Eucharistica, second edition, 1865.)


She holds a lily in her hand,
Where long ranks of Angels stand,
A silver lily for her wand.

All her hair falls sweeping down;...

Within thine eyes two spirits dwell,
The sweetest and the purest
That ever wove Love's mystic spell,
Or plied his arts the surest:
No smile of morn,
Though heaven-born,...