Fair flower, that dost so comely grow,
Hid in this silent, dull retreat,
Untouched thy honied blossoms blow,
Unseen thy little branches greet:
No roving foot shall crush thee here,
No busy hand provoke a tear.

By Nature's self in white arrayed,
She bade thee shun the vulgar eye,
And planted here the guardian shade,
And sent soft waters murmuring by;
Thus quietly thy summer goes,
Thy days declining to repose.

Smit with those charms, that must decay,
I grieve to see your future doom;
They died--nor were those flowers more gay,

Two shall be born the whole wide world apart;
And speak in different tongues, and have no thought
Each of the other's being, and no heed;
And these o'er unknown seas to unknown lands
Shall cross, escaping wreck, defying death,
And all unconsciously shape every act
And bend each wandering step to this one end,—
That, one day, out of darkness, they shall meet
And read life's meaning in each other's eyes.
And two shall walk some narrow way of life
So nearly side by side, that should one turn
Ever so little space to left or right

Though Scotland's hills be far awa',
And her glens, where the clear silver burnies row,
I see them and hear her wild breezes blaw,
O'er the moors where the blue-bells and heather grow.

Oh, hame is sweet!—but thae hames o' thine
Are the kindliest far that the sun doth see;
And, though far awa' I have biggit mine,
As my mother's name they are dear to me!

I love the tale, o' thy glories auld,
Which thy shepherds tell on the mountain side;
Of thy martyrs true and thy warriors bauld,
Who for thee and for freedom lived and died!

CLXXXIII

Pain of all pain, the most grievous pain
Is to love heartily and cannot be loved again.

Love with unkindness is causer of heaviness,
Of inward sorrow and sighs painful.
Whereas I love is no redress
To no manner of pastime: the sprites so dull
With privy mournings and looks rueful,
The body all wearish, the colour pale and wan,
More like a ghost than like a living man

When Cupido hath inflamed the heart's desires
To love there as is disdain;
Of good or ill the mind oblivious,
Nothing regarding but love t'attain;

When Nature dreamt of making bores,
She formed a brace of Phillimores;
Sooner than make a Phillimost,
Nature herself would yield the ghost.

As o'er the cradle of her Son
The blessèd Mary hung,
And chanted to the Anointed One
The psalms that David sung,

What joy her bosom must have known,
As, with a sweet surprise,
She marked the boundless love that shone
Within his infant eyes.

But deeper was her joy to hear,
Even in his ripening youth,
And treasure up, from year to year,
His words of grace and truth.

Oh, may we keep his words like her
In all their life and power,
And to the law of love refer
The acts of every hour.

Love is the master of the ring
And life a circus tent.
What is this silly song you sing?
Love is the master of the ring.

I am afraid!
Afraid of Love
And of Love's bitter whip!
Afraid,
Afraid of Love
And Love's sharp, stinging whip.

What is this silly song you sing?
Love is the master of the ring.

Friends whose own griefs had borne the heaviest stroke
Best saw into his eyes, but never spoke …
Lover of children, pictures, books, and flowers,
Art was for him man's life, man's life an art,
Gracious of step and voice in hall or home …
He once brought Vergil to these lakes of ours,
But Vergil, kinsman of his gentle heart,
Took him forever from us back to Rome.

Coiled on a hot white stone
The adder basks
And nothing asks
Save to be let alone.

Yet somewhere in the ling
An enemy
Crawls stealthily
To rouse him up to sting:

So he must lift his head
Once more to fight,
Till in the light
He or his foe lie dead.

O heart, that you might rest,
And naught again
Rouse from their den
The angers of my breast!

On a verdant summer islet
I beheld a wondrous scene,
In a trance of dreamy waking—
Burial of a Fairy Queen!

First I heard some small pipes playing,
Like faint night-winds on the breeze,
Or the sound of distant rain-drops,
As they fall among the trees.

Floating softly o'er the waters,
And from every bell of foam,
The fairy anthem echoed sweetly,
Sad as thoughts of distant home.

Next the sound, as if of footsteps,
O'er the grass plot mov'd along;
And distinctly came the accents
Of the solemn funeral song.