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A blossom pink, a blossom blue,
Make all there is in love so true.
'Tis fit, methinks, my heart to move,
To give it thee, sweet girl, I love!
Now, take it, dear, this morn and wear...

TO THE ASPIRING NEGRO YOUTH
...

Thou most majestic Queen of sculptural art,
What learn'd architect designed thy throne?
Who traced thy stately form in head and heart,
And sent the sculptor forth to carve the stone?...

For the sun that shone at the dawn of spring,
For the flowers which bloom and the birds that sing,
For the verdant robe of the gray old earth,
For her coffers filled with their countless worth,...

The sweetest singer once thou wast, but art no more;
An elf thou wast of what thou now shalt be,
Where thou art in realms of that celestial shore;
There thou shalt sing through all eternity....

I am a pilgrim far from home,
A wanderer like Mars,
And thought my wanderings ne'er should come,
So fixed behind the bars!

I left my sunny Southern home
Beneath the silver stars;...

TO D. M. M.


Greeks once sang a lovely song
To their maiden Cora;
But my lay floats soft along
To my Dainty Dora.

Frenchmen sing of Anne Belle,
Romans sang of Flora;...

Flag of the free, our sable sires
Have borne thee oft before
Into hot battles' hell-lit fires,
Against the fiercest foe.
When first he shook his shaggy mein,
And made the welkin ring,...

TO MY LOST BROTHER


Ships the angry sea is lashing;
But I launch my little bark,
Though the thunder peals are crashing,
And the sea is pitchy dark!
See by lightning's vivid flashing...

'Tis once in life our dreams come true,
The myths of long ago,
Quite real though fairy-like their view,
They surge with ebb and flow;
Thus thou, O haunt of childhood dreams,
More beauteous and fair...

There is nothing so sweet as our life in our dreams,
When we soar far on fancy's swift wing;
For a thing in our dreams is all that it seems,
And the songs are so sweet that we sing....

Written in Quinn Chapel, A. M. E. Church, Ninth and Walnut Streets, Louisville, Ky., Wednesday evening, October 16th, 1907, while Miss Lula E. Johnson was singing "Ave Maria."

...

Aye! many a rhyme my pen has flown,
In oblivion, all unknown;
Still many more, perchance, I say,
Float on in one unbroken lay -
But ask me naught of where or when,
Long as they ring in hearts of men!...

I then acted as agent for the "Zion Record," published by Rev. R. A. Adams, 39 St. Catherine Street, Natchez, Miss., until August 20, 1902. Knowing that there was a dormitory to be built for girls at Alcorn, I went there, hopin...

Put nothing in another's way,
Who's plodding on through life,
But fill each heart with joy each day,
With peace instead of strife.
So then let not a missent word,
Or thought, or act, or deed...

While I keep my lonely hall,
You are welcome one and all,
As I sing my little song;
Stay, I'll cheer you all day long -
And sow my bachelor-buttons,
And sow my bachelor-buttons.
...

Though man through life so swiftly wends,
And o'er its journey runs his race;
Though rough, or smooth, or 'round the bends,
In distance putting fleetest friend:
Alas! there comes a halting place,...

I hold a token in my hand,
A very tiny thing;
And yet within its golden band
A thousand memories cling.

Aye! thrice ten thousand memories cling
Of signal victories won,...

TO A. B. B.


Thou art, fair maid, the Morning Star,
The guide of dawning day,
And sendest diamond sparkles far
To wake the flowers of May.

Thou makest earth to bloom anew,...

I

O, fairest Dame of sylvan glades,
We come to pay thee homage due,
Embrace thee softly and to kiss
Thy lovely, long-forsaken cheeks;
To smooth thy flowing silver locks...