English

'Twas a saying in use with the great Mr Lowndes,
Take all care of the pence and no care of the pounds;
For the pence may escape you like volatile elves,
While the slow solid pounds can take care of themselves.

The limpid river, past its bushes
Running slowly as my chariot,
Becomes a fellow voyager
Returning home with the evening birds.
A ruined city-wall overtops an old ferry,
Autumn sunset floods the peaks.
… Far away, beside Mount Sung,
I shall close my door and be at peace.

A MIGHTY and a mingled throng
Were gather'd in one spot;
The dwellers of a thousand homes—
Yet 'midst them voice was not.

The soldier and his chief were there—
The mother and her child:
The friends, the sisters of one hearth—
None spoke—none moved—none smiled.

There lovers met, between whose lives
Years had swept darkly by;
After that heart-sick hope deferr'd—
They met—but silently.

You might have heard the rustling leaf,
The breeze's faintest sound,
The shiver of an insect's wing,

There was a braw ball in Edinburgh,
And mony braw ladies were there,
But nae ane at a' the assembly
Could wi Lizzie Lindsay compare.

In cam the young laird o Kincassie,
An a bonnie young laddie was he:
‘Will ye lea yere ain kintra, Lizzie,
An gang to the Hielands wi me?’

She turned her roun on her heel,
An a very loud laughter gaed she:
‘I wad like to ken whar I was ganging,
And wha I was gaun to gang wi.’

‘My name is young Donald M'Donald,
My name I will never deny;

So when you go wherever it is you will go
take the moon with you
and make it wear that democratic white shroud,
pocketless, since rich and poor,
we take nothing with us, save a small stick or dowel
in the casket, so we can all
burrow through the earth to the Holy Land
when the time is right.
Please forgive that I confessed your amusement
at Shakespeare’s “mewling and puking”
in my eulogy. (No one laughed—my delivery was off—
but Otto the Undertaker smiled.)
He told me that when I shovel some dirt onto
your soft wood box,

Give Womanhood and Childhood both their Due;
The Lioness and Cubs are Lions, too.

“T OO little Closet Room!” cries Eve, and frowns;
For Adam says, “Too many Frocks and Gowns!”

“N O , I can't sew,” she said, “or cook a bit!”
And, strange to tell, the Girl was Proud of it!

I N Courtship, so the Saying goes,
One “Yes” will mend a Hundred “Noes.”

“G ROW tall!” the Rabbis said in Days that Were,
“But if thy Wife be little, stoop to her.”

The life of man
Is an arrow's flight,
Out of darkness
Into light,
And out of light
Into darkness again;
Perhaps to pleasure,
Perhaps to pain!

There must be Something,
Above, or below;
Somewhere unseen
A mighty Bow,
A Hand that tires not,
A sleepless Eye
That sees the arrows
Fly, and fly;
One who knows
Why we live—and die.

There are lonely hearts to cherish
While the days are going by;
There are weary souls who perish,
While the days are going by,
If a smile we can renew,
As our journey we pursue,
Oh, the good that we may do,
While the days are going by.

There's no time for idle scorning,
While the days are going by;
Let your face be like the morning,
While the days are going by,
Oh, the world is full of sighs,
Full of sad and weeping eyes;
Help your fallen brothers rise,
While the days are going by.

Dreamer , waiting for darkness with sorrowful, drooping eyes,
—Linger not in the valley, bemoaning the day that is done!
Climb the hills of morning and welcome the rosy skies—
—Never yet was the setting so fair as the rising sun!

Dear is the past; its treasures we hold in our hearts for aye;
—Woe to the hand that would scatter one wreath of its garnered flowers;
But larger blessing and honor will come with the waking day—
—Hail, then, To-morrow, nor tarry with Yesterday's ghostly hours!

He has gone to the land where the dead are still,
And mute the song of gladness;
He drank at the cup of grief his fill,
And his life was a dream of madness;
The victim of fancy's torturing spell,
From hope to darkness driven,
His agony was the rack of Hell,
His joy the thrill of Heaven.

He has gone to the land where the dead are cold,
And thought will sting him—never;
The tomb its darkest veil has rolled
O'er all his faults for ever;
O, there was a light that shone within
The gloom that hung around him;