He gave me all, and then he laid me by.
Straining my strings to breaking, with his pain,
He voiced an anguish, through my wailing cry,
Never to speak again.

He pressed his cheek against me, and he wept—
Had we been glad together over much?—
Emotions that within me deep had slept
Grew vibrant at his touch,

And I, who could not ask whence sprung his sorrow
Responsive to a grief I might not know,
Sobbed as the infant that each mood doth borrow
Sobs for the mother's woe.

Wild grew my voice and stormy, with his passion,

No round boy-satyr, racing from the mere,
Shakes on the mountain lawn his dripping head
This many a May, your sister being dead,
Ye Christian folk! your sister great and dear.
To breathe her name, to think how sad-sincere
Was all her searching, straying, dreaming, dread,
How of her natural night was Plato bred
(A star to keep the ways of honour clear),

Who will not sigh for her? who can forget
Not only unto campèd Israel,
Nor martyr-maids that as a bridegroom met
The Roman lion's roar, salvation fell?
To Him be most of praise that He is yet

In regard to Eternity (said the Old Mandarin)
I feel about it as I do about one of my teeth.
Every now and then it gives me
A devil of a twinge,
And for a while
I groan and can think of naught else.
Then the anguish abates and I dismiss it from my mind.
But I know, just the same,
That some day
I've got to go through with it.

Lawgiver, if thy aim is good,
Make thy laws known, and understood.

A TENDER child of summers three,
Seeking her little bed at night,
Paused on the dark stair timidly.
“Oh, mother! Take my hand,” said she,
“And then the dark will all be light.”

We older children grope our way
From dark behind to dark before;
And only when our hands we lay,
Dear Lord, in Thine, the night is day,
And there is darkness nevermore.

Reach downward to the sunless days
Wherein our guides are blind as we,
And faith is small and hope delays;
Take Thou the hands of prayer we raise,
And let us feel the light of Thee!

I will not mourn thee, lovely one,
Though thou art torn away.
'Tis said that if the morning sun
Arise with dazzling ray

And shed a bright and burning beam
Athwart the glittering main,
'Ere noon shall fade that laughing gleam
Engulfed in clouds and rain.

And if thy life as transient proved,
It hath been full as bright,
For thou wert hopeful and beloved;
Thy spirit knew no blight

If few and short the joys of life
That thou on earth couldst know,
Little thou knew'st of sin and strife
Nor much of pain and woe.

The winds are out in the abysm of night;
The blown trees stoop.
But man invented fire and candle-light,
And man invented soup.

Good reader! if you e'er have seen,
When Phoebus hastens to his pillow,
The mermaids, with their tresses green,
Dancing upon the western billow:
If you have seen, at twilight dim,
When the long spirit's vesper hymn
Floats wild along the western shore,
If you have seen, through mist of eve,
The fairy train their ringlets weave,
Glancing along the spangled green:--
If you have seen all this, and more,
God bless me, what a deal you've seen!

There was an Old Person of Florence,
Who held mutton chops in abhorrence;
He purchased a Bustard, and fried him in Mustard,
Which choked that Old Person of Florence.

OH, THE COMFORT —the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person,
Having neither to weigh thoughts,
Nor measure words—but pouring them
All right out—just as they are—
Chaff and grain together—
Certain that a faithful hand will
Take and sift them—
Keep what is worth keeping—
And with the breath of kindness
Blow the rest away.