Short Poems

Star light, star bright,
First star I've seen tonight,
Wish I may, wish I might,
Have this wish I wish tonight.

The soul that's fed on Nature is content
To lift itself in all-adoring love
Unto the Father who such glories sent, —
A shadow of the fairer joys above.

Some, striving knowledge to refine,
Consume themselves with thinking;
And some, whose friendship's drowned in wine,
Are kindly killed with drinking;
And some are wrecked on Indian coasts,
Thither with gain invited:
And some in smoke of battle lost,
Whom drums, not lutes, delighted.

Soldiers who wish to be a hero
Are practically zero,
But those who wish to be civilians,
Jesus, they run into millions.

To-day, how far may he have wandered,
The brave hunter of dragon flies?

So sweet the plum trees smell!
Would that the brush that paints the flower
Could paint the scent as well.

I come to look, and lo,
The plum tree petals scatter down
A fall of purest snow.

So Paradise was brightened, so 'twas blest,
When Innocence and Beauty it possest.
Such was it's more retired Path and Seat,
For Eve and musing Angels a Retreat .
Such Eden's Streams, and Banks, and tow'ring Groves;
Such Eve her self, and such her Muse and Loves .
Only there wants an Adam on the Green ,
Or else all Paradise might here be seen.

So I may gain thy death, my life I'll give;
My life's thy death and in thy death I live;
Or else, my life, I'll hide thee in his grave,
By three days' loss eternally to save.

Sneeze on a Monday, you sneeze for danger;
Sneeze on a Tuesday, you'll kiss a stranger;
Sneeze on a Wednesday, you sneeze for a letter;
Sneeze on a Thursday, for something better;
Sneeze on a Friday, you sneeze for sorrow;
Sneeze on a Saturday, your sweetheart to-morrow;
Sneeze on a Sunday, your safety seek —
The devil will have you the whole of the week.

A SNAIL , who had a way, it seems,
Of dreaming very curious dreams,
Once dreamed he was — you'll never guess! —
The Lightning Limited Express!