This is the tale the old men tell, the tale that was told to me, Of the blue-green dragon, The dreadful dragon, The dragon who flew so free, The last of his horrible scaly race...
O never laugh again! Laughter is dead, Deep hiding in her grave, A sacred thing. O never laugh again, Never take hands and run Through the wild streets, Or sing, Glad in the sun:...
Belov'd, I would tell a ghostly thing That hides beneath the simple name of Spring; Wild beyond hope the news - the dead return, The shapes that slept, their breath a frozen mist,...
I wore my heart upon my sleeve, Tis most unwise, they say, to do - But then how could I but believe The foolish thing was safe with you? Yet, had I known, 'twas safer far...
Not that Queen Venus of adulterous fame, Whose love was lust's insatiable flame - Not hers the house I would be singer in Whose loose-lipped servants seek a weary sin:...
War I abhor, And yet how sweet The sound along the marching street Of drum and fife, and I forget Wet eyes of widows, and forget Broken old mothers, and the whole Dark butchery without a soul....
To Man in haste, flushed with impatient dreams Of some great thing to do, so slowly done, The long delay of Time all idle seems, Idle the lordly leisure of the sun; So splendid his design, so brief his span,...
There's a line of rails on an upland green With a good take-off and a landing sound, Six fences grim as were ever seen, And it's there I would be with fox and hound. Oh, that was a country free and fair...
When the embalmer closed my eyes, And all the family went in black, And shipped me off to Paradise, I had no thought of coming back; I dreamed of undisturbed repose Until the Judgment Day went crack,...
In the long shimmer of the Sound May I some day be laughing found, Part of its restless to and fro, A humble worker of the tides That round the sleepless planet flow,...
You that would break with the Past, Why with so rude a gesture take your leave? None hinders, go your way; but wherefore cast Contempt and boorish scorn Upon the womb from which even you were born?...
Why did you go away without one word, Wave of the hand, or token of good-bye, Nor leave some message for me with flower or bird, Some sign to find you by;
When you and I were younger the world was passing fair; Our days were sped with laughter, our steps were free as air; Life lightly lured us onward, and ceased not to unroll...
If after times Should pay the least attention to these rhymes, I bid them learn 'Tis not my own heart here That doth so often seem to break and burn - O no such thing! - Nor is it my own dear...
What of the darkness? Is it very fair? Are there great calms and find ye silence there? Like soft-shut lilies all your faces glow With some strange peace our faces never know,...
Dear Heart, this is my book of boyish song, The changing story of the wandering quest That found at last its ending in thy breast - The love it sought and sang astray so long...
But, Song, arise thee on a greater wing, Nor twitter robin-like of love, nor sing A pretty dalliance with grief - but try Some metre like a sky, Wherein to set Stars that may linger yet...