This trivial box seems not the fitting thing
To hide such magic with its black tin lid.
Oh, build it rather like the pyramid
In whose deep crypt is buried some old king;
A crypt adorned with ancient lettering;
Graved with strange shapes and legendary tales
Wherein old riddles spread metallic veils
With many a sacred cross and devil's ring.
Set reasonings here with query and surmise,
And syllogisms from some logician's brain.
Inscribe vague prophecies whose half-closed eyes
Shine like dim jewels set by Tubal-cain.
Carve magic here with iridescence fine

Here lieth Personal magic in a box.
All that my father had he left to me.
His ghostly properties defy these locks.
His Will still works, although I lose the key.
If here stood Judge and Jury … yet austere, free,
My father's Will, ungovernable, unshaken,
Would point his finger at the Judge—and he
Would say, ‘This woman's wealth shall not be taken.’
So in this box I feel it throbbing still,
That living entity, my father's Will.
And I still see, concealed in this black tin,
His pulsing energy that throbs within.
If from this box his Will can rise and save

I, from the clerk, receive my private key,
With curious circumstance and grave parade.
Now my strong box is on the table laid.
There's a stout wall between all folks and me.
The door is locked so that no one shall see.
Here with my fortune I sit down alone—
This glittering skeleton, this golden bone.
With what I do no man can disagree.
And all this pompous opening of locks
And shutting them again that I may look
As if by stealth into a black tin box,
And cut off coupons in a little book!
Here lies my wealth, swathed like a buried king.

How nonchalantly I spend with little thrift
His proud sparse earnings which were the frugal pay
Of a man's stout' will and honorable day.
What insolent spending of that sturdy gift!
When I reflect on him he seems like one
Who on a bleak hill set a lonely pine.
He saw the North Star in its branches shine.
His honest valors are by me undone.
Why I should own his box I cannot see.
For his scant legacy I am unfit.
Yet since he's in the yard I have his key,
And somehow I am master over it.
I am like one who decks the Holy Tree

Old Oscar, how feebly thou crawl'st to the door,
Thou who wert all beauty and vigour of yore;
How slow is thy stagger the sunshine to find,
And thy straw-sprinkled pallet—how crippled and blind!
But thy heart is still living—thou hearest my voice—
And thy faint-wagging tail says thou yet canst rejoice;
Ah! how different art thou from the Oscar of old,
The sleek and the gamesome, the swift and the bold!

At sunrise I wakened to hear thy proud bark,
With the coo of the house-dove, the lay of the lark;
And out to the green fields 'twas ours to repair,

Sometimes I catch sweet glimpses of his face,
But that is all.
Sometimes he looks on me and seems to smile,
But that is all.
Sometimes he speaks a passing word of peace,
But that is all.
Sometimes I think I hear his loving voice
Upon me call.

And is this all he meant when thus he spoke,—
“Come unto me?”
Is there no deeper, more enduring rest
In him for thee?
Is there no steadier light for thee in him?
O come and see.

O come and see! O look, and look again;
All shall be right;
Oh taste his love, and see that it is good,

When tempests swept the pine-clad Appenines,
Humbling the pride of many a towering tree,
The fierce storm music to thy heart was free:
And when the wild bee, in the clustering vines
Where sleepy Arno like a jewel shines.
Winged lazily, he sang sweet songs to thee,
And winds that held weird murmurs of the sea
Made for thy soul vast, echo-haunted shrines.
What are the ages to a soul like thine,
Whose work is for all time, soaring away
From pain, and death, and every earth-made bound?
Ah! fadeless are the wreaths the long years twine

He is gone! he is gone!
Like the leaf from the tree;
Or the down that is blown
By the wind o'er the lea.
He is fled, the light-hearted!
Yet a tear must have started
To his eye, when he parted
From love-stricken me!

He is fled! he is fled!
Like a gallant so free,
Plumed cap on his head,
And sharp sword by his knee;
While his gay feathers fluttered,
Surely something he muttered,
He at least must have uttered
A farewell to me!

He's away! he's away
To far lands o'er the sea,—
And long is the day
Ere home he can be;

Ah, who is the stranger,
With morn in his eyes,
The desperate ranger
Of earth and skies?

Whose, whose are the fancies
That fly with the moon?
Ah, who is it dances
To the faery-pipes' tune?

Who is this finds his heaven
In his mother's blue eyes,
Ere the years number seven,
Or the morning star dies?

Ah, who is the stranger
Who never could die,
The scorner of danger?
Ah child, was it I?

Now in the summer of life sweet-heart, You say you love but
me, Gladly I give all my heart to you,
Throbbing with ecstacy. But last night I saw while a-
dreaming, The future old and gray, And I
wondered if you'll love me then dear, Just as you do today.
You say the glow on my cheek sweet-heart, Is like the rose so
sweet; But when the bloom of fair youth has flown,
Then will our lips still meet? When life's setting sun fades a-
way dear, And all is said and done, Will your
arms still entwine and caress me, Will our hearts beat as one?