Short Poems

Suppose the stars
Fall and break? — Do they ever sound
Like my own love song?

Thank God! there is always a Land of Beyond
For us who are true to the trail;
A vision to seek, a beckoning peak,
A farness that never will fail;
A pride in our soul that mocks at a goal,
A manhood that irks at a bond,
And try how we will, unattainable still,
Behold it, our Land of Beyond!

The gas flame seemed to be fanning itself —
The kitchen was so hot.
Mrs. Smith left the steaming stove
To cool her moist cheek at the fire-escape window;
Surprised to see that the sky was still there
She wondered if there were Smiths on each soft star.
Mr. Smith shouted from the dining room:
" The soup was good, Ann; I'm ready for the meat! "

Years are coming, years are going, creeds may change and pass away,
But the power of love is growing stronger, surer, day by day,
Be ye as the light of morning, like the beauteous dawn unfold,
With your radiant lives adorning all the world in hues of gold.
Selfish claims will soon no longer raise their harsh, discordant sounds,
For the law of love will conquer, bursting hatred's narrow bounds;
Human love will spread a glory filling men with gladsome mirth,
Songs of joy proclaim the story of a fair, transfigured earth.

To ward off Time's abuses
The name is set above,
By one who loves the Muses,
Of one the Muses love.

James painted black moustaches round his nose,
And in the glass a sneering Satan smiled.
I thought once more how harrowingly glows
Beneath the cork the innocence of a child.

Have you not seen
The dove-grey waters' undulating sheen
Whereon a bird can rest
Its rounded, slowly, slowly heaving breast,
Whilst all the blue-aired delicate mountains round
Attend, without a sound?
So, freed from fear, man's first primeval crime,
A heart might rest upon the lap of time.

A child has eyes like dewberries; a child has cheeks like flame;
A child feels sudden love and hate, and sudden fear and shame.
I was a child when to the woods out of the womb I came.
The woods have aged, and so have I: I am as old as care;
My spirit is as dry as crust, my heart is cold and bare: —
Yet have I still a child's light laugh and still a child's strange stare.

As I tramped off to join the fight
A blackbird nodded to me — so!
Said, " Hope we'll see you back all right.
Keep safe. Cheero! "

In Thesaly, ther Asses fine are kept,
fayre, smoth, plump, fat and full:
The mangers they are fild, the stables clenly swept
And yet their pace is very slow and dull.
So sotes oft tymes haue vnto honour crept,
when wiser men haue hadd a coulder pull,
If Asses haue such luck what shall I say?
Let Scollers burne their bookes & goe to play.