Works

(WRITTEN FOR A FRIEND'S BIRTHDAY.)

"The days of our life are threescore years and ten."


A birthday: - and a day that rose
With much of hope, with meaning rife -...

The dove laid some little sticks,
Then began to coo;
The gnat took his trumpet up
To play the day through;
The pie chattered soft and long -
But that she always does;
The bee did all he had to do,...

Hark! a lover binding sheaves
To his maiden sings,
Flutter, flutter go the leaves,
Larks drop their wings.
Little brooks for all their mirth
Are not blythe as he.
"Give me what the love is worth...

It was a village built in a green rent,
Between two cliffs that skirt the dangerous bay
A reef of level rock runs out to sea,
And you may lie on it and look sheer down,...

Lying imbedded in the green champaign
That gives no shadow to thy silvery face,
Open to all the heavens, and all their train,
The marshalled clouds that cross with stately pace,...

"Thy gentleness hath made me great."

Now winter past, the white-thorn bower
Breaks forth and buds down all the glen;
Now spreads the leaf and grows the flower:
So grows the life of God, in men.
...

A cottager leaned whispering by her hives,
Telling the bees some news, as they lit down,
And entered one by one their waxen town.
Larks passioning hung o'er their brooding wives,...

On the rocks by Aberdeen,
Where the whislin' wave had been,
As I wandered and at e'en
Was eerie;

There I saw thee sailing west,
And I ran with joy opprest -
Ay, and took out all my best,...

(Old Style.)

Methought the stars were blinking bright,
And the old brig's sails unfurled;
I said, "I will sail to my love this night
At the other side of the world."...

The logs burn red; she lifts her head,
For sledge-bells tinkle and tinkle, O lightly swung.
"Youth was a pleasant morning, but ah! to think 'tis fled,
Sae lang, lang syne," quo' her mother, "I, too, was young."...

Little babe, while burns the west,
Warm thee, warm thee in my breast;
While the moon doth shine her best,
And the dews distil not.

All the land so sad, so fair -...

Once upon a time, I lay
Fast asleep at dawn of day;
Windows open to the south,
Fancy pouting her sweet mouth
To my ear.
She turned a globe
In her slender hand, her robe...

I saw when I looked up, on either hand,
A pale high chalk-cliff, reared aloft in white;
A narrowing rent soon closed toward the land, -
Toward the sea, an open yawning bight.
...

"Martin, I wonder who makes all the songs."
"You do, sir?"
"Yes, I wonder how they come."
"Well, boy, I wonder what you'll wonder next!"
"But somebody must make them?"
"Sure enough."...

I passed an inland-cliff precipitate;
From tiny caves peeped many a soot-black poll;
In each a mother-martin sat elate,
And of the news delivered her small soul.
...

I walked beside a dark gray sea.
And said, "O world, how cold thou art!
Thou poor white world, I pity thee,
For joy and warmth from thee depart.

"Yon rising wave licks off the snow,...

When in a May-day hush
Chanteth the Missel-thrush
The harp o' the heart makes answer with murmurous stirs;
When Robin-redbreast sings,
We think on budding springs,...

When I hear the waters fretting,
When I see the chestnut letting
All her lovely blossom falter down, I think, "Alas the day!"
Once with magical sweet singing,
Blackbirds set the woodland ringing,...

"Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house."

Such as have not gold to bring Thee,
They bring thanks - Thy grateful sons;
Such as have no song to sing Thee,...

Toll -
Toll.' 'The bell-bird sounding far away,
Hid in a myall grove.' He raised his head,
The bush glowed scarlet in descending day,
A masterless wild country - and he said,...