I marked in the midst of the glittering throng
A figure all bent and retreating;
His raiment was shabby, and bearded his face,
His gaze was bewildering and fleeting;
And those whose drossiness glared through the gilt
Guffawed a contemptuous greeting.

Intently I peered in his time-lined face
And read there his marvelous story;
His brows were large with the wisdom of pain,
His locks by affliction made hoary;
A memory lurked in the depth of his eyes,
A prayer and a vision of glory.

A mem'ry aglow with the splendors of old,

Kiss me then, my merry May,
By the soul of love I pray!
Prithee, nay! Tell, tell me why?
If with you I sport and play,
My mother will be vexed to-day.
Tell me why, oh tell me why.

Cruisers, destroyers, carriers align
For a great show of force at victory's sign.
Far lands acknowledge our increased domain
And hail us leaders of the nations' train.

Power and showy pride—can these replace
The radiance of innocence and grace?
The imperative of penitential tears?
And freedom from our vast ambitions' fears?

Cruisers, destroyers, carriers align
For a great show of force at victory's sign.
Far lands acknowledge our increased domain
And hail us leaders of the nations' train.

Power and showy pride—can these replace

He never was a silly little boy
Who whispered in the class or threw spit balls,
Or pulled the hair of silly little girls,
Or disobeyed in any way the laws
That made the school a place of decent order
Where books were read and sums were proven true
And paper maps that showed the land and water
Were held up as the real wide world to you.
Always, he kept his eyes upon his books:
And now he has grown to be a man
He is surprised that everywhere he looks
Life rolls in waves he cannot understand,
And all the human world is vast and strange—

When the chapel bell struck the midnight hour
And the campus lay asleep,
We'd count the strokes from the ivy tower,
Then out from our dens we'd creep;
And the guiding star in the lonely night
For all of that rollicking crew,
As it gleamed afar—'twas the signal light
Where she waited for me and you.

Oh, sweet co-ed! Oh, college maid!
The one we went to serenade.
Oh, star-lit night!
Oh, glimpse of white,
At the window overhead!
Back, through the years
Of smiles and tears.
I'll dream of that rare co-ed.

Knedneuch land
And a loppert sea
And a lift like a blue-douped
Mawkin'-flee.

I'm famished, but fegs!
What's here for a man
But a wheen rubbish that's lain
Sin' Time began?

The sun has a goût
And the mune's hairy-mouldit,
And wha but auld Daith
Has a stummack to hold it?

I'll thraw the lot oot
And lippen to get fresh,
For the sicht o'ts eneuch
To turn my soul nesh!

Unlike the triflers whose contracted view
Ne'er looks beyond a glitt'ring outside show,
In this machine with moral eyes survey
How gliding life steals silently away,
And, mindful of it's short determin'd space,
Improve the flying moments, as they pass.

See rolling years, with quick dispatch, decide
The transient date of sublunary pride:
See beauty, genius, fortune, fair, sublime,
Borne headlong down the rapid stream of time:
O'er their sad wrecks, along the fatal shore,
Rapacious death asserts his tyrant pow'r;

Apprentice to life and death,
Pin a gay flower on your coat!
It will not bruise the throat
That draws a tightened breath,
Or slow the quick pulse, fever rushed,
Or stir the dull heart, hushed.
It is harmless; it can do
No more than you
White coated, debonair,
So leave it there.

Where Thou art not no day holds light for me,
The brightest noontide turns to midnight deep;
There no bird sings, but awesome shadows creep,—
Persistent ghosts that hold my memory,
And walk where Joy and Hope once walked with thee,
And in thy place their lonesome vigil keep,—
Sad shades that haunt the inmost ways of sleep,
No kindly morning ever bids them flee.

Those tireless footsteps, will they never cease?
Like crownless queens they tread their ancient ways,—
Pale phantoms of old dreams and vanished days,—
And mock my poor endeavors after peace.

Love , it is night. The orb of day
Has gone to hit the cosmic hay.
Nocturnal voices now we hear.
Come, heart's delight, the hour is near
When Passion's mandate we obey.

I would not, sweet, the fact convey
In any crude and obvious way:
I merely whisper in your ear—
“Love, it is night!”

Candor compels me, pet, to say
That years my fading charms betray.
Tho' Love be blind, I grant it's clear
I'm no Apollo Belvedere.
But after dark all cats are gray.
Love, it is night!