home

There is room for you. You are alone with your few sheaves of rice.
My boat is crowded, it is heavily laden, but how can I turn you
away? Your young body is slim and swaying; there is a twinkling
smile in the edge of your eyes, and your robe is coloured like the
rain cloud.
The travellers will land for different roads and homes. You
will sit for a while on the prow of my boat, and at the journey's
end none will keep you back.
Where do you go, and to what home, to garner your sheaves? I

Two men I saw reel from a bar
And stumble down the street;
Coarse and uncouth as workmen are,
They walked with wobbly feet.
I watched them, thinking sadly as
I heard their hobnails clink,
The only joy a toiler has
Is to get drowned in drink.
II
A kitten on a wall,
A skinny, starving stray;
It looked so pitifully small,
A fluff of silver grey.
One of the men came to a stand,
A kindly chap was he,
For with a huge and horny hand
He stroked it tenderly.
III

The longer I live and the more I see
Of the struggle of souls towards the heights above,
The stronger this truth comes home to me---
That the Universe rests on the shoulders of love,
A love so limitless, deep, and broad,
That men have re-named it, and called it God.

And nothing that was ever born or evolved,
Nothing created by light or force
But deep in its system there lies dissolved
A shining drop from the great Love source;
A shining drop that shall live for aye;

You were glad to-night: and now you’ve gone away.
Flushed in the dark, you put your dreams to bed;
But as you fall asleep I hear you say
Those tired sweet drowsy words we left unsaid.

Sleep well: for I can follow you, to bless
And lull your distant beauty where you roam;
And with wild songs of hoarded loveliness
Recall you to these arms that were your home.

Man's rich with little, were his judgment true;
Nature is frugal, and her wants are few;
Those few wants answer'd, bring sincere delights;
But fools create themselves new appetites:
Fancy and pride seek things at vast expense,
Which relish not to reason, nor to sense.
When surfeit, or unthankfulness, destroys,
In nature's narrow sphere, our solid joys,
In fancy's airy land of noise and show,
Where nought but dreams, no real pleasures grow;
Like cats in air-pumps, to subsist we strive

I1.
Love is enough: though the World be a-waning
.
And the woods have no voice but the voice of complaining,
.
Though the sky be too dark for dim eyes to discover
.
The gold-cups and daisies fair blooming thereunder,
.
Though the hills be held shadows, and the sea a dark wonder,
.
And this day draw a veil over all deeds passed over,
.
Yet their hands shall not tremble, their feet shall not falter;
.
The void shall not weary, the fear shall not alter

I went out to the farthest meadow,
I lay down in the deepest shadow;

And I said unto the earth, "Hold me,"
And unto the night, "O enfold me,"

And unto the wind petulantly
I cried, "You know not for you are free!"

And I begged the little leaves to lean
Low and together for a safe screen;

Then to the stars I told my tale:
"That is my home-light, there in the vale,

"And O, I know that I shall return,
But let me lie first mid the unfeeling fern.

Lovers all are soldiers, and Cupid has his campaigns:
I tell you, Atticus, lovers all are soldiers.
Youth is fit for war, and also fit for Venus.
Imagine an aged soldier, an elderly lover!
A general looks for spirit in his brave soldiery;
a pretty girl wants spirit in her companions.
Both stay up all night long, and each sleeps on the ground;
one guards his mistress's doorway, one his general's.
The soldier's lot requires far journeys; send his girl,
the zealous lover will follow her anywhere.

All right. I may have lied to you and about you, and made a few
pronouncements a bit too sweeping, perhaps, and possibly forgotten
to tag the bases here or there,
And damned your extravagence, and maligned your tastes, and libeled
your relatives, and slandered a few of your friends,
O.K.,
Nevertheless, come back.

Come home. I will agree to forget the statements that you issued so
copiously to the neighbors and the press,
And you will forget that figment of your imagination, the blonde from Detroit;

Cor zu' bravo sbordone a manimanca,
Du' pellegrini a or de vemmaria
Cercaveno indov'era l'osteria,
Perc'uno aveva male in d'una cianca.

Ce s'incontra er zor Lotte, e je spalanca
Er portone dicenno: "A casa mia"
E loro je risposeno: "Per dia
Dimani sarai fio de l'oca bianca".

Quelli ereno du' angeli, fratello,
Che ar vedelli passà li Ghimorrini
Se sentinno addrizzà tutti l'ucello.

E arrivonno a strillà, fiji de mulo:
"Lotte, mannece giù li pellegrini,