Works

All that a man can say of woman's charms,
Mine eyes have spoken and my lips have told
To you a thousand times. Your perfect arms
(A replica from that lost Melos mould),...

One night Nurse Sleep held out her hand
To tired little May.
"Come, go with me to Wonderland,"
She said, "I know the way.
Just rock-a-by - hum-m-m,
And lo! we come...

The world grows green on a thousand hills -
By a thousand willows the bees are humming,
And a million birds by a million rills,
Sing of the golden season coming.
But, gazing out on the sun-kist lea,...

The world grows green on a thousand hills -
By a thousand willows the bees are humming,
And a million birds by a million rills,
Sing of the golden season coming.
But, gazing out on the sun-kist lea,...

"He is mad as a hare, poor fellow,
And should be in chains," you say.
I haven't a doubt of your statement,
But who isn't mad, I pray?
Why, the world is a great asylum,
And people are all insane,...

"He is mad as a hare, poor fellow,
And should be in chains," you say.
I haven't a doubt of your statement,
But who isn't mad, I pray?
Why, the world is a great asylum,
And people are all insane,...

He said he loved me! Then he called my hair
Silk threads wherewith sly Cupid strings his bow,
My cheek a rose leaf fallen on new snow;
And swore my round, full throat would bring despair...

Do you think, dear, as you say
Such a light good-bye to-day,
That this parting time may be
Mayhaps less to you, than me?

What a wonder of surprise
Looks out from your sunny eyes....

A lovely little keeper of the home,
Absorbed in menu books, yet erudite
When I need counsel; quick at repartee
And slow to anger. Modest as a flower,
Yet scintillant and radiant as a star....

Like the tenth wave, that offers to the shore
Accumulated opulence and force,
So does my heart, which thought it loved of yore,
Carry increasing passion down the course
Of time to proffer thee....

(Intended for recitation at club dinners.)


To-night when I came from the club at eleven,
Under the gaslight I saw a face -
A woman's face! and I swear to heaven...

How cold the old porch seems. A dreary chill
Creeps upward from the river at twilight,
And yet, I like to linger here at night,
And dream the summer tarries with us still.
...

Let the old snow be covered with the new:
The trampled snow, so soiled, and stained, and sodden.
Let it be hidden wholly from our view
By pure white flakes, all trackless and untrodden....

A yacht from its harbor ropes pulled free,
And leaped like a steed o'er the race track blue,
Then up behind her, the dust of the sea,
A gray fog drifted, and hid her from view.

Sit still, I say, and dispense with heroics!
I hurt your wrists? Well, you have hurt me.
It is time you found out that all men are not stoics,
Nor toys to be used as your mood may be....

Quite carelessly I turned the newsy sheet;
A song I sang, full many a year ago,
Smiled up at me, as in a busy street
One meets an old-time friend he used to know.
...

I heard a strain of music in the street -
A wandering waif of sound. And then straightway
A nameless desolation filled the day.
The great green earth that had been fair and sweet,...

Above her veil a shrouded Moorish maid
Showed melting eyes, as limpid as a lake;
A brow untouched by care; a band of jetty hair,
And nothing more. The all-concealing haik...

As when the old moon lighted by the tender
And radiant crescent of the new is seen,
And for a moment's space suggests the splendor
Of what in its full prime it once has been,...

It was long and long ago our love began;
It is something all unmeasured by time's span:
In an era and a spot, by the Modern World forgot,
We were lovers, ere God named us, Maid and Man.
...