O. Henry—Apothecary

Where once he measured camphor, glycerine,
Quinine and potash, peppermint in bars,
And all the oils and essences so keen
That druggists keep in rows of stoppered jars—
Now, blender of strange drugs more voiatile,
The master pharmacist of joy and pain
Dispenses sadness tinctured with a smile
And laughter that dissolves in tears again.

O brave apothecary! You who knew
What dark and acid doses life prefers,
And yet with friendly face resolved to brew
These sparkling potions for your customers—

The Dying Soldier

Brother , whence comest thou?
From beyond Dunai?
What heardest thou in Ukraine?

Nothing have I heard,
Nothing have I seen,
But horsemen on four sides.
The Russians have covered the mountain.

On that mountain a Turkish horse stands,
On the horse sits a Turk's young son.
In his right hand he holds a sword,
From his left blood flows.
. . . . . . .

On the rocky steeps a horse is standing;
It is neighing aloud that Love may succour;
It is pawing the earth in woe and anguish.

Spring Dresses

The bashful Spring girl-shy begins
To show her art; a green web spins
To clothe the shivering tracery
Of every patient, pleading tree.

And on her wild bird-singing loom
She 'broiders bright the veil with bloom,
And girlish-proud, the happy trees
Flaunt their new dresses to the breeze.

To a Scotch Tune, Mary Scot

Where Thames, along the daisied meads,
His wave in lucid mazes leads,
Silent, slow, serenely flowing,
Wealth on either shore bestowing,
There in a safe though small retreat
Content and Love have fix'd their seat;
Love, that counts his duty pleasure,
Content that knows and hugs his treasure.
From art, from jealousy, secure,
As faith unblam'd, as friendship pure,
Vain opinion nobly scorning,
Virtue aiding, life adorning;
Fair Thames, along thy flowery side,
May those whom truth and reason guide,

Shipwreck

Night and a starless sky,
Ship on wild billows tost,
With tattered sails and opening seams,
And deck bestrewn with falling beams,
Swift plunging to her doom.

Red lightnings round her flash,
Loud thunders crash and roar,
And the noble vessel mounts the crest
Of the reeking waves, then sinks to rest
Mid carnival of woe.

The Petrel soars aloft,
Wailing her hymn of death,
And the dirge like sounds pierce the blackened sky,
While the crew send forth one anguished cry,
Sinking to lowest depth.

My Picture

Stand this way—more near the window—
By my desk—you see the light
Falling on my picture better—
Thus I see it while I write!

Who the head may be I know not,
But it has a student air;
With a look half sad, half stately,
Grave sweet eyes and flowing hair.

Little care I who the painter,
How obscure a name he bore;
Nor, when some have named Velasquez,
Did I value it the more.

As it is, I would not give it
For the rarest piece of art;
It has dwelt with me, and listened

Land's End

Here rage the furies that have shaped the world,
Here where a beaked old headland splits the sea
And white Niagaras of the surf are hurled
In crashing enmity
Against the rocks' worn giant filigree.
Above the thunder where the wave and shore
Merge and re-merge in fountain-bursts of spray,
The weird continual half-yelping roar
Of congregated seals rings out all day
From islets wet and gray.
And pelicans in heavy lines flap by,
And gulls skim low beneath the precipice,
And hunchback cypresses, limb-twisted, lie

Marcus Hook

Above the Market stood the School
On pillars brick to have it cool,
A stair went steep, outside the stalls,
Where climbed the girls in hoods and shawls,
A market there was never told,
We played like calves they might have sold.
Some said a Fair of old forsook
The market school of Marcus Hook.

Still was a Fair beholden there:
The fishers' girls were always fair;
To learn their spells they swung their feet
Beneath the bench the boys to vex,
Their country shoulders bare to meet
The swaying freedom of their necks

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