For thirty years I read, and mused, and wrote,
Or idly angled from my fishing-boat;
Or wandered through the woods, or climbed the hills,
Listening to songsters and to murmuring rills;

Or sauntering in my garden talked with flowers,
As friend with friend, for many happy hours;
Or working in my fields ablaze with golden grain,
And herbs and fruits which keep life clean and sane.

Far from the busy mart and huckstering crowd,
Striving for gold or place with brawlings loud,—
From youth to middle age I've passed my days

Although P'yongyang is my capital,
Although I love the repaired city,
Instead of parting I'd rather stop spinning
If you love me I'll follow you with tears.

Were the pearls to fall on the rock,
Would the thread be broken?
If I parted from you a thousand years,
Would my heart be changed?

Not knowing how wide the river is,
You pushed the boat off, boatman.
Not knowing how loose your wife is,
You had my love board the ferry, boatman.

The flower beyond the Taedong River,
When he has crossed the shore

In December we make merry,
Christmas time brings mirth to all;
Holly boughs with scarlet berry
Gaily shine upon the wall.
Then with rosy cups o'erflowing
Let us speed the parting year:
Hope within our bosoms glowing
Hail the future banish fear.

January brings the blast,
Hail storms obscure the sky;
Lake and stream are frozen fast;
O'er the ice the skaters fly;
When the winds are gone to rest
Crumbs to pretty Robins throw;
See his soft and ruddy breast
Pillowed on a tuft of snow.

February veiled in clouds
Fills the pool and floods the plain:
Thickest mist the landscape shrowds,
Loosed is every icy chain:
When the sun is faintly beaming
We the golden crocus hail,
While the snowdrops softly gleaming
Shiver in the chilly gale.

Like a lion March comes in,

COME TO THE FESTAL board tonight,
For bright-eyed beauty will be there,
Her coral lips in nectar steeped
And garlanded her hair.

Come to the festal board tonight,
For there the joyous laugh of youth
Will ring those silvery peals which speak
Of bosoms pure and stainless truth.

Come to the festal board tonight,
For friendship there with stronger chain
Devoted hearts already bound
For goodwill will bind again.
I went.
Nature and art their stores outpoured,
Joy beamed in every kindling glance;
Love, friendship, youth and beauty smiled.

How happily fate hath together joyn'd,
Two feeble men, one lame, and t'other blind!
The blind Man bears the lame, the lame supplies,
By his direction, t'others want of eyes.
See what the iron power of need can do,
It makes the blind to see, the lame to go.

How loveable all infant beauties are!
How sweet, in form and colour, are thine eyes!
Disks of two living flowers, that, rooted far
Within thy spirit, do report its joys,
And pass its half-hour's sorrows on to heaven,
To sun themselves and vanish; but, in prayer,
Their best expression comes; through the deep air
They see their Lord, like those of holy Stephen.
Far off, dear child! be that unhappy time,
When aught of hard or shrewd shall settle there,
Of wanton boldness, or of blighting crime;
So Age may haply find them, as they were,

There are things
Feet know
That hands never will:
The exciting
Pounding feel
Of running down a hill;

The soft cool
Prickliness
When feet are bare
Walking in
The summer grass
To most anywhere;

Or dabbling in
Water all
Slip-sliddering through toes—
(Nicer than
Through fingers though why
No one really knows.)

“Toes, tell my
Fingers,” I
Said to them one day,
“Why it's such
Fun just to
Wiggle and play.”

But toes just
Looked at me
Solemn and still.
Oh, there are things
Feet know

A sepal, petal, and a thorn
Upon a common summer's morn,
A flash of dew, a bee or two,
A breeze
A caper in the trees,—
And I'm a rose!

What though Reason forged your scheme?
'Twas Reason dreamed the Utopia's dream:
'Tis dream to think that Reason can
Govern the reasoning creature, man.