Brief words, when actions wait, are well: The prompter's hand is on his bell; The coming heroes, lovers, kings, Are idly lounging at the wings; Behind the curtain's mystic fold...
Dow's flat. That's its name; And I reckon that you Are a stranger? The same? Well, I thought it was true, For thar isn't a man on the river as can't spot the place at first view. ...
'The sky is clouded, the rocks are bare, The spray of the tempest is white in air; The winds are out with the waves at play, And I shall not tempt the sea to-day.
It was the morning season of the year; It was the morning era of the land; The watercourses rang full loud and clear; Portala's cross stood where Portala's hand Had planted it when Faith was taught by Fear,...
Do I sleep? do I dream? Do I wonder and doubt? Are things what they seem? Or is visions about? Is our civilization a failure? Or is the Caucasian played out?
Oh, you're the girl lives on the corner? Come in if you want to come quick! There's no one but me in the house, and the cook but she's only a stick....
'Crying!' Of course I am crying, and I guess you would be crying, too, If people were telling such stories as they tell about me, about you. Oh yes, you can laugh if you want to, and smoke as you didn't care how,...
O poor Romancer thou whose printed page, Filled with rude speech and ruder forms of strife, Was given to heroes in whose vulgar rage No trace appears of gentler ways and life! ...
Which I wish to remark, And my language is plain, That for ways that are dark And for tricks that are vain, The heathen Chinee is peculiar, Which the same I would rise to explain. ...
Now shift the blanket pad before your saddle back you fling, And draw your cinch up tighter till the sweat drops from the ring: We've a dozen miles to cover ere we reach the next divide....
Our window's not much, though it fronts on the street; There's a fly in the pane that gets nothin' to eat; But it's curious how people think it's a treat For me to look out of the window! ...