English

I have derived all beauty from denial,
All grace from darkness, wonder from dismay;
And strength has come, with wisdom, from betrayal;
Vision from anguish, grandeur from decay.
The flesh holds empire only for a while;
A dream, however frustrate on its way,
Burns starward through a deathless mile-on-mile.
Only the feasts and satisfactions slay.

So from the white refusal of your lips,
The exile in the gesture of your hands,
Release has come for all my sunken ships
Straining to re-essay the final strands.

The woman was old and ragged and gray
And bent with the chill of the Winter's day.

The street was wet with a recent snow
And the woman's feet were aged and slow.

She stood at the crossing and waited long,
Alone, uncared for, amid the throng

Of human beings who passed her by
Nor heeded the glance of her anxious eye.

Down the street, with laughter and shout,
Glad in the freedom of "school let out,"

Came the boys like a flock of sheep,
Hailing the snow piled white and deep.

More innocently born and calmer seems
In its soft summer haze
This Sunday morning than all other days.
No early footsteps walk into my dreams,
A peace is everywhere
As if the whole created world believed in prayer,
Over the solitary fields of wheat,
And down the village street,
And on my folded clothes across the chair.

I know my foolishness, a mere ant trying to shake a tree;
Such is the tyro's urge, ever to criticize.
With old age, leaving behind a thousand poems—
By whom will their strengths and weaknesses be judged?

Though ease and plenty, fruits of wealth,
And all the means of life and health,
And sweet convenience, please us;
In poverty, which most we dread,
Without a house above my head,
Or feathers to make soft my bed,
My soul could rest in Jesus.

When he came down from heav'n to earth,
The manger was his place of birth,
A chamber was denied him;
And when, to do his Father's will,
With loving kindness, pow'r, and skill,
He went about, quite lowly still,
The women's hands supplied him.

From the Isle of the West the captive came,
Downcast his eyes, but not with shame;
The soldier is sad at the captive's chain,
As he thinks of his own far home again:
The fortune of battle hath chained his hand,
And led him away to a southern land;
But his lofty soul is unconquered still—
Fetters cannot subdue that brave one's will;
Though his chain is deep in his dungeon floor,
And the bolts are brass of his triple door,
And darkness is round him, and racks are nigh,
His heart is not craven, he fears not to die.

I had ma clothes cleaned
Just like new.
I put 'em on but
I still feels blue.

I bought a new hat,
Sho is fine,
But I wish I had back that
Old gal o' mine.

I got new shoes,—
They don't hurt ma feet,
But I ain't got nobody
For to call me sweet.

Light ! for the stars are pale; light! for the high moon wanes;
Whither now hides the sun, that all we stricken blind,
Feel not his eyes, hear not the thunders of the wind
Flung round him trumpet-toned about his clear domains?
Morn's rose along night's verge with folded wing disdains
Our twilight miserable and hopes of humankind,
Hardly we catch its breath: is the great sun less kind,
Than falling stars, frail moons, than night's cloud hurricanes?

Darkling we dwindle deathward, and our dying sight

A CERTAIN young woman, named Hannah,
Slipped down on a piece of banana;
She shrieked, and oh - my'd!
And more stars she spied
Than belongs to the star - spangled banner.

A gentleman sprang to assist her,
And picked up her muff and her wrister.
“Did you fall, ma'am?” he cried;
“Do you think,” she replied,
“I sat down for the fun of it, Mister?”

Three gipsy men I saw one day
Stretched out on the grass together,
As wearily o'er the sandy way
My wagon brushed the heather.

The first of the three was fiddling there
In the glow of evening pallid,
Playing a wild and passionate air,
The tune of some gipsy ballad.

From the second's pipe the smoke-wreaths curled,
He watched them melt at his leisure.
So full of content, it seemed the world
Had naught to add to his pleasure.

And what of the third!—He was fast asleep,
His harp to a bough confided;