A Prayer Of Time

Move onward, Time, and bring us sooner free

From this self--clouding turmoil where we ply

On others' errands driven continually:

O lead us to our own souls, ere we die!

We toil for that we love not; thou concealest

Our true loves from us; all we thirst to attain

Thou darkly holdest, and alone revealest

A mirror that our sighs for ever stain.

A Hymn Of Love

O hush, sweet birds, that linger in lonely song!

Hold in your evening fragrance, wet May--bloom!

But drooping branches and leaves that greenly throng,

Darken and cover me over in tenderer gloom.

As a water--lily unclosing on some shy pool,

Filled with rain, upon tremulous water lying,

With joy afraid to speak, yet fain to be sighing

Its riches out, my heart is full, too full.

Magnets

A far look in absorbed eyes, unaware

Of what some gazer thrills to gather there;

A happy voice, singing to itself apart,

That pulses new blood through a listener's heart;

Old fortitude; and, 'mid an hour of dread,

The scorn of all odds in a proud young head;—

These are themselves, and being but what they are,

Of others' praise or pity have no care,

"Pale are the words I build for my delight"

Pale are the words I build for my delight

To house in; pale as the chill mist that holds

An ardent morn. My fire to others' sight

But dimly burns through the frail speech it moulds;

I cast but shadows from my inward light.

But, O my Joy, thou understandest well

Both what I can and what I cannot tell.

"Beautifully dies the year"

Beautifully dies the year.

Silence sleeps upon the mere:

Yellow leaves float on it, stilly

As, in June, the opened lily.

Brushing o'er the frosty grass

I watch a moment, ere I pass,

From beeches that will soon be bare

Down the still November air

"Ah, now this happy month is gone"

Ah, now this happy month is gone,

Not now, my heart, complain,

Nor rail at Time because so soon

He takes his own again.

He takes his own, the weeks, the hours,

But leaves the best with thee;

Seeds of imperishable flowers

In fields of memory.

"How dark, how quiet sleeps the vale below!"

How dark, how quiet sleeps the vale below!

In the dim farms, look, not a window shines:

Distantly heard among the lonely pines,

How soft the languid autumn breezes flow

Past me, and kiss my hair, and cheek, and mouth!

Half--veiled is the calm sky:

Jupiter's kingly eye

Alone glows full in the unclouded South.

A Dialogue

The Man.

O tyrannous Angel, dreadful God,

Who taught thee thus to wield thy rod?

So jealous of a happy heart,

Thou smot'st our happy souls apart,

And chosest too the weaker prey,

Refusedst the worthier foeman!

The Angel.

One Year Old

Is it we that are wise, is it we,

Who have bought with a price of grief

A wisdom seldom free

From scorn or disbelief,

Who find this world fulfil

An end that is not our will,

Who toil with the light in our eyes

Showing us scarce begun

"Come back, sweet yesterdays!"

Come back, sweet yesterdays!

Sweet yesterdays, come back!

Ah! not in my dreams only

Vex me with joy, to wake

From dream to truth, twice lonely,

And with renewed heart--ache.

Let night be wholly black,

So day have some kind rays.

A Picture Seen In A Dream

I saw the Goddess of the Evening pause

Between two mountain pillars. Tall as they

Appeared her stature, and her outstretched hands

Laid on those luminous cold summits, hung

Touching, and lingered. Earth was at her feet.

Her head inclined: then the slow weight of hair,

In distant hue like a waved pine--forest

Upon a mountain, down one shoulder fell.

Koya San

High on the mountain, shrouded in vast trees,

The stillness had the chastity of frost.

I trod the fallen pallors of the moon.

The path was paven stone: I was not lost,

But followed whither it should lead me soon

Into the mountain’s midmost secrecies.

Wandering into the mind, sweet, luminous, warm

Remembrances of the body,—