The meanest man I ever saw
Allus kep' inside o' the law;
And ten-times better fellers I've knowed
The blame' gran'-jury's sent over the road.

My belovèd is like unto a slender fir-tree,
Like unto a singing water-brook,
And like unto a budding rose
When the dew falleth at morning-tide.
And her beauty's might is as it were a great army,
Which overthroweth its enemies
With a thunderous noise, and rusheth forward
And crieth aloud: “Who can resist me?”

Say unto me, ye daughters of Vermland,
Ye who tend flocks in the mountains,
Or sit by the roadside
Conversing together,
Have ye seen my belovèd,
Have ye seen whether my budding rose
Went by this way?

If Beauty be at all, if, beyond sense,
There be a wisdom piercing into brains,
Why should the glory wait on impotence,
Biding its time till blood is in the veins?

There is no beauty, but, when thought is quick,
Out of the noisy sickroom of ourselves
Some flattery comes to try to cheat the sick,
Some drowsy drug is groped for on the shelves.

There is no beauty, for we tread a scene
Red to the eye with blood of living things;
Thought is but joy from murder that has been,
Life is but brute at war upon its kings.

Was you at de hall las' night,
To de Leap Yeah Party?
I reckon dat I was,
But didn't I eat hearty?

I wouldn't hab missed gwine dar,
Fo' sumpin purty fine;
Dem folks was sholy lookin' good,
En had one sumptious time.

En ebery which a way you went
About de day befo',
Some one was standin' at yo' fence,
Or knockin' at yo' do'.

Axin dese here questions:
Is you gwine out to-night?
What color is you gwine to w'ar,
Yaller, blue or white?

Is you gwine to twis' yo' hwar up high,
Or let it cum down low?

Bleak, rugged, hills, o'er which the winter snow
In wild gusts swept;
A sweet, green vale, a calm lake, lying low,
Where osiers dipt;
A clear, cool spring, whose trickling overflow,
Through tall grass crept.

There were some hearts that love me. Till my own
Shall cease to beat.
Whether I tread smooth ways, or jagged stone
With bleeding feet.
I still shall hold them precious (love alone
Can make life sweet.)

Long years have fled. Still stand, deep scarred and hoar,
The wind swept heights;

Scent of plum blossoms—
beneath the guest's nose
a blue lacquer bowl.

Thou deadly crater, moulded by my muse,
Cast thou thy bronze into my bowed and wounded heart,
And let my soul its vengeance to thy bronze impart!

I SAID , “The bitterness of grief is gone;
Henceforward I will only think of her
As one too glad for selfish tears to stir—
A saint who touched and blessed me and passed on;
My angel evermore to bend and take
My broken prayers to God for love's dear sake.”

“The bitterness of grief is passed,” I said;
Then turned and saw about me everywhere
The dear, accustomed things her touch made fair;
Her books—the little pillow for her head,
The pen her hand had dropped, the simple song
She laughed in singing when a note went wrong.

Hirmophrodite in sense in Art a monster
as by your railing rimes the world may Conster
Your spitefull words against a harmless booke
shews that an ass much like the Sire doth looke
Men truly noble fear no touch of Blood
Nor question make of others much more good
Can such comparisons seeme the want of witt
When oysters have enflamd your blood with it
But it appeares your guiltiness gapt wide
And filld with Dirty doubt your brains swolne tide
Both frind and foe in deed you use alike
And your madd witt in sherry aequall strike

I stood in Paris at the tomb
Of him who crossed the bleak Alps' ridge,
And charged o'er Lodi's bloody bridge,
Till Europe heard his cannons' boom:

Who made the haughty Hapsburg yield,
Who watched the flames from Kremlin's tower,
Who Elba fled, but fell from power
On Waterloo's tremendous field.

He was a dreamer in his youth,
His eyes were dull, his face was pale;
But, knowing no such word as fail,
He wrought his visions into truth.

Second alone to him of Rome
He sits within the halls of fame;
His glory France's, though he came,