Works

(After he has been extemporizing upon the musical instrument of his invention)


I.
Would that the structure brave, the manifold music I build,
Bidding my organ obey, calling its keys to their work,...

[Supposed of Pamphylax the Antiochene:
It is a parchment, of my rolls the fifth,
Hath three skins glued together, is all Greek,
And goeth from Epsilon down to Mu:
Lies second in the surnamed Chosen Chest,...

If one could have that little head of hers
Painted upon a background of pale gold,
Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers!
No shade encroaching on the matchless mould...

I am indeed the personage you know.
As for my wife, what happened long ago
You have a right to question me, as I
Am bound to answer.

('Son, a fit reply!'...

Take the cloak from his face, and at first
Let the corpse do its worst!
How he lies in his rights of a man!
Death has done all death can.
And, absorbed in the new life he leads,
He recks not, he heeds...

Shortly after the Revival of Learning in Europe


Let us begin and carry up this corpse,
Singing together.
Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar thorpes
Each in its tether...

I.

So far as our story approaches the end,
Which do you pity the most of us three?
My friend, or the mistress of my friend
With her wanton eyes, or me?

II.
...

Some people hang portraits up
In a room where they dine or sup:
And the wife clinks tea-things under,
And her cousin, he stirs his cup,
Asks 'Who was the lady, I wonder?'...

I.

Oh, what a dawn of day!
How the March sun feels like May!
All is blue again
After last night's rain,
And the South dries the hawthorn-spray.
Only, my Love's away!...

Oh, good gigantic smile o' the brown old earth,
This autumn morning! How he sets his bones
To bask i' the sun, and thrusts out knees and feet
For the ripple to run over in its mirth;...

But do not let us quarrel any more,
No, my Lucrezia; bear with me for once:
Sit down and all shall happen as you wish.
You turn your face, but does it bring your heart?...

Karshish, the picker-up of learning's crumbs,
The not-incurious in God's handiwork
(This man's-flesh he hath admirably made,
Blown like a bubble, kneaded like a paste,...

I.
June was not over
Though past the fall,
And the best of her roses
Had yet to blow,
When a man I know
(But shall not discover,
Since ears are dull,
And time discloses)...

I

My love, this is the bitterest, that thou
Who art all truth and who dost love me now
As thine eyes say, as thy voice breaks to say
Shouldst love so truly and couldst love me still...

A simple ring with a single stone,
To the vulgar eye no stone of price:
Whisper the right word, that alone,
Forth starts a sprite, like fire from ice,
And lo, you are lord (says an Eastern scroll)...

'We shall soon lose a celebrated building.'
- Paris Newspaper.



I.

No, for I 'll save it! Seven years since,
I passed through Paris, stopped a day...

Such a starved bank of moss
Till, that May-morn,
Blue ran the flash across:
Violets were born!

Sky, what a scowl of cloud
Till, near and far,
Ray on ray split the shroud:...

And so you found that poor room dull,
Dark, hardly to your taste, my dear?
Its features seemed unbeautiful:
But this I know, 'twas there, not here,
You plighted troth to me, the word...

I.
That fawn-skin-dappled hair of hers,
And the blue eye
Dear and dewy,
And that infantine fresh air of hers!

II.
To think men cannot take you, Sweet,
And enfold you,...

A.
You blame me that I ran away?
Why, Sir, the enemy advanced:
Balls flew about, and who can say
But one, if I stood firm, had glanced
In my direction? Cowardice?
I only know we don't live twice,...