Stay awhile, thou blessed band, be entreated, daughters of heaven!
While the chance-met scholar of Wisdom learneth your sacred names:
He is resting a little from his toil, yet a little on the borders of earth,
And fain would he have you his friends, to bid him glad welcome hereafter.
Who among the glorious art thou, that walkest a Goddess and a Queen,
Thy crown of living stars, and a golden cross thy sceptre?
Who among flowers of loveliness is she, thy seeming herald,
Yet she boasteth not thee nor herself, and her garments are plain in their neatness?
Wherefore is there one among the train, whose eyes are red with weeping.
Yet is her open forehead beaming with the sun of ecstasy?
And who is that blood-stained warrior, with glory sitting on his crest?
And who that solemn sage, calm in ...

Into that good old Hebrew’s soul sublime
The spirit of the wilderness had passed;
For where the thunders of imperial Storm
Rolled over mighty hills; and where the caves
Of cloud-capt Horeb rang with hurricane;
And where wild-featured Solitude did hold
Supreme dominion; there the prophet saw
And heard and felt that large mysterious life
Which lies remote from cities, in the woods
And rocks and waters of the mountained Earth.
And so it came to pass, Elijah caught
That scholarship which gave him power to see
And solve the deep divinity that lies
With Nature, under lordly forest-domes,
And by the seas; and so his spirit waxed,
Made strong and perfect by its fellowship
With God’s authentic world, until his eyes
Became a splendour, and his face was as
A gl...

When winds and seas do rage
And threaten to undo me,
Thou dost, their wrath assuage
If I but call unto Thee.

A mighty storm last night
Did seek my soul to swallow,
But by the peep of light
A gentle calm did follow.

What need I then despair,
Though ills stand round about me;
Since mischiefs neither dare
To bark or bite without Thee?

Stretch towards the moonless midnight of the trees,
As though that hand could reach to where they stand,
And they but famous old upholsteries
Delightful to the touch; tighten that hand
As though to draw them closer yet.
Rammed full
Of that most sensuous silence of the night
(For since the horizon's bought strange dogs are still)
Climb to your chamber full of books and wait,
No books upon the knee, and no one there
But a Great Dane that cannot bay the moon
And now lies sunk in sleep.
What climbs the stair?
Nothing that common women ponder on
If you are worth my hope! Neither Content
Nor satisfied Conscience, but that great family
Some ancient famous authors misrepresent,
The proud Furies each with her torch on high.

"Be Still, and know that I am God!"


Be silent, Soul! - though dark thy path and dreary,
    And wild with storm, yet what is that to thee?
Though thou art faint, and desolate, and weary,
    Thy God hath willed thus, - so let it be!
Murmurs the mountain oak when storms assail it,
    And warring tempests wildly shake its form?
Firmer within the earth its root it striketh,
    And gathers strength and vigor from the storm.

Be silent, Soul! - the hand of God is on thee!
    And, as a skillful gard'ner, from the vine
Doth lop away each worthless branch and barren,
    So He would lop each fruitless bough of thine.
Ah! thou art earth-bound, prone, and lowly creeping,
    clinging to things too frail to be thy stay;
Jesus, with watchful care His vineya...

I.

Nature, so far as in her lies,
Imitates God, and turns her face
To every land beneath the skies,
Counts nothing that she meets with base,
But lives and loves in every place;



II.

Fills out the homely quickset-screens,
And makes the purple lilac ripe,
Steps from her airy hill, and greens
The swamp, where humm’d the dropping snipe,
With moss and braided marish-pipe;



III.

And on thy heart a finger lays,
Saying, ‘Beat quicker, for the time
Is pleasant, and the woods and ways
Are pleasant, and the beech and lime
Put forth and feel a gladder clime.’



IV.

And murmurs of a deeper voice,
Going before to some far shrine,
Teach that sick heart the stronger choice,

Tell me, chaste spirit! in yon orb of light,
Which seems to wearied souls an ark of rest,
So calm, so peaceful, so divinely bright--
Solace of broken hearts, the mansion of the bless'd!

Tell me, oh! tell me--shall I meet again
The long lost object of my only love!
--This hope but mine, death were release from pain;
Angel of mercy! haste, and waft my soul above!

He halted in the wind, and, what was that
Far in the maples, pale, but not a ghost?
He stood there bringing March against his thought,
And yet too ready to believe the most.

'Oh, that's the Paradise-in-bloom,' I said;
And truly it was fair enough for flowers
had we but in us to assume in march
Such white luxuriance of May for ours.

We stood a moment so in a strange world,
Myself as one his own pretense deceives;
And then I said the truth (and we moved on).
A young beech clinging to its last year's leaves.

Kind solace in a dying hour!
Such, father, is not (now) my theme
I will not madly deem that power
Of Earth may shrive me of the sin
Unearthly pride hath revelled in
I have no time to dote or dream:
You call it hope that fire of fire!
It is but agony of desire:
If I can hope O God! I can
Its fount is holier more divine
I would not call thee fool, old man,
But such is not a gift of thine.

Know thou the secret of a spirit
Bowed from its wild pride into shame
O yearning heart! I did inherit
Thy withering portion with the fame,
The searing glory which hath shone
Amid the Jewels of my throne,
Halo of Hell! and with a pain
Not Hell shall make me fear again
O craving heart, for the lost flowers
And sunshine of my summer hours!
The u...

On drives the road - another mile! and still
Time's horses gallop down the lessening hill
O why such haste, with nothing at the end!
Fain are we all, grim driver, to descend
And stretch with lingering feet the little way
That yet is ours - O stop thy horses, pray!

Yet, sister dear, if we indeed had grace
To win from Time one lasting halting-place,
Which out of all life's valleys would we choose,
And, choosing - which with willingness would lose?
Would we as children be content to stay,
Because the children are as birds all day;

Or would we still as youngling lovers kiss,
Fearing the ardours of the greater bliss?
The maid be still a maid and never know
Why mothers love their little blossoms so
Or can the mother be content her bud
Shall never op...

When haughty expectations prostrate lie,
And grandeur crouches like a guilty thing,
Oft shall the lowly weak, till nature bring
Mature release, in fair society
Survive, and Fortune's utmost anger try;
Like these frail snowdrops that together cling,
And nod their helmets, smitten by the wing
Of many a furious whirl-blast sweeping by.
Observe the faithful flowers! if small to great
May lead the thoughts, thus struggling used to stand
The Emathian phalanx, nobly obstinate;
And so the bright immortal Theban band,
Whom onset, fiercely urged at Jove's command,
Might overwhelm, but could not separate!

    Better to smell the violet
    Than sip the glowing wine;
    Better to hearken to a brook
    Than watch a diamond shine.

    Better to have a loving friend
    Than ten admiring foes;
    Better a daisy's earthy root
    Than a gorgeous, dying rose.

    Better to love in loneliness
    Than bask in love all day;
    Better the fountain in the heart
    Than the fountain by the way.

    Better be fed by mother's hand
    Than eat alone at will;
    Better to trust in God, than say,
    My goods my storehouse fill.

    Better to be a little wise
    Than in knowledge to abound;
    Better to teach a child than toil
    To fill perfection's round.

    Better to sit at some man's feet
    Than thrill a l...

Maiden May sat in her bower,
In her blush rose bower in flower,
Sweet of scent;
Sat and dreamed away an hour,
Half content, half uncontent.

"Why should rose blossoms be born,
Tender blossoms, on a thorn
Though so sweet?
Never a thorn besets the corn
Scentless in its strength complete.

"Why are roses all so frail,
At the mercy of the gale,
Of a breath?
Yet so sweet and perfect pale,
Still so sweet in life and death."

Maiden May sat in her bower,
In her blush rose bower in flower,
Where a linnet
Made one bristling branch the tower
For her nest and young ones in it.

"Gay and clear the linnet trills;
Yet the skylark only, thrills
Heaven and earth
When he breasts the height, and fills
Height and depth ...

Thou wast hard pressed, yet God concealed this thing
From me; and thou wast wounded very sore,
And beaten down, O son of Israel’s king,
Like wheat on threshing-flour.

Thou, that from courtly and from wise for friend
Didst choose me, and in spite of ban and sneer,
Rebuke and ridicule, until the end
Didst ever hold me dear!

All night thy body on the mountain lay:
At morn the heathen nailed thee to their wall.
Surely their deaf gods hear the songs to-day
O’er the slain House of Saul!

Oh! if that witch were here thy father sought,
Methinks I e’en could call thee from thy place,
To shift thy mangled image from my thought,
Seeing thy soul’s calm face.

I sorrowed for the words the prophet spoke,
That set me rival to thy father’s line;

The human heart will never change,
The human dream will still go on,
The enchanted earth be ever strange
With moonlight and the morning sun,
And still the seas shall shout for joy,
And swing the stars as in a glass,
The girl be angel for the boy,
The lad be hero for the lass.

The fashions of our mortal brains
New names for dead men's thoughts shall give,
But we find not for all our pains
Why 'tis so wonderful to live;
The beauty of a meadow-flower
Shall make a mock of all our skill,
And God, upon his lonely tower
Shall keep his secret - secret still.

The old magician of the skies,
With coloured and sweet-smelling things,
Shall charm the sense and trance the eyes,
Still onward through a million springs;
And nothing old and nothin...

Somewhere or other there must surely be
    The face not seen, the voice not heard,
The heart that not yet - never yet - ah me!
    Made answer to my word.

Somewhere or other, may be near or far;
    Past land and sea, clean out of sight;
Beyond the wandering moon, beyond the star
    That tracks her night by night.

Somewhere or other, may be far or near;
    With just a wall, a hedge, between;
With just the last leaves of the dying year
    Fallen on a turf grown green.

Here, in mine old-time harbourage installed,
Lulled by the murmurous hum of London's traffic
To that full calm which may be justly called
Seraphic,

I praise the gods; and vow, for my escape
From the hard grip of premature Jehannun,
One golden-tissued bottle of the grape
Per annum.

For on this day, from Orient toils enlarged,
Kneeling, I kissed the parent soil at Dover,
Where a huge porter in his orbit charged
Me over;

Flashed in the train by Shorncliffe's draughty camp;
Gazed on the hurrying landscape's pastoral graces,
Old farms, and happy fields (a trifle damp
In places);

Passed the grim suburbs, indigent and bare
Of natural foliage, but bravely flying
Frank garlandry of last week's underwear
Out drying;

And ...

(After Horace)

Let others praise, as fancy wills,
    Berlin beneath her trees,
Or Rome upon her seven hills,
    Or Venice by her seas;
Stamboul by double tides embraced,
Or green Damascus in the waste.

For me there's nought I would not leave
    For the good Devon land,
Whose orchards down the echoing cleeve
    Bedewed with spray-drift stand,
And hardly bear the red fruit up
That shall be next year's cider-cup.

You too, my friend, may wisely mark
    How clear skies follow rain,
And, lingering in your own green park
    Or drilled on Laffan's Plain,
Forget not with the festal bowl
To soothe at times your weary soul.

When Drake must bid to Plymouth Hoe
    Good-bye for many a day,
And some were sad and feared ...