'Tis well with words, oh masters, ye have sought To turn men's yearning to the great and true, Yet first take heed to what your own hands do; By deeds not words the souls of men are taught;...
Slow figures in some live remorseless frieze, The approaching days escapeless and unguessed, With mask and shroud impenetrably dressed; Time, whose inexorable destinies Bear down upon us like impending seas;...
Yearning upon the faint rose-curves that flit About her child-sweet mouth and innocent cheek, And in her eyes watching with eyes all meek The light and shadow of laughter, I would sit...
O Power to whom this earthly clime Is but an atom in the whole, O Poet-heart of Space and Time, O Maker and Immortal Soul, Within whose glowing rings are bound, Out of whose sleepless heart had birth...
By silent forest and field and mossy stone, We come from the wooded hill, and we go to the sea. We labour, and sing sweet songs, but we never moan, For our mother, the sea, is calling us cheerily....
Harsh thoughts, blind angers, and fierce hands, That keep this restless world at strife, Mean passions that, like choking sands, Perplex the stream of life,
"Grotesque!" we said, the moment we espied him, For there he stood, supreme in his conceit, With short ears close together and queer feet Planted irregularly: first we tried him...
O little one, daughter, my dearest, With your smiles and your beautiful curls, And your laughter, the brightest and clearest, O gravest and gayest of girls;