Think not that this enchanted isle
Wherein I dwell, some days a king,
Postpones till June its tardy smile,
And only knows imagined spring.

Not yet my lilies are in bloom;
But lo! my cherry, bridal-white,
Whose sweetness fills my sunny room,
The bees, and me, with one delight.

And on the brink of Lanham Brook
The laughing cowslips catch mine eye,
As on the bridge I stop to look
At the stray blossoms loitering by.

Our almond-willow waves its plumes
In contrast with the dark-haired pine,

Eternal Father! thou hast said
That Christ all glory shall obtain;
That He who once, a sufferer, bled,
Shall o'er the world, a conquerer, reign.

We wait thy triumph, Savior, King!
Long ages have prepared the way;
Now all abroad thy banner fling,
Set Time's great battle in array.

Thy hosts are mustered to the field,
" The cross " — " The cross " — their battle-call;
The old grim towers of darkness yield,
And soon shall totter to their fall.

On mountain tops the watch-fires glow,

IN RETURN FOR A TALBOTYPE PICTURE OF VENICE

Poet and friend! if any gift could bring
A joy like that of listening while you sing,
'T were such as this,—memorial of the days,
When Tuscan airs inspired more tender lays;
When the gray Apennine, or Lombard plain,
Sunburnt, or spongy with autumnal rain,
Mingled perchance, as first they met your sight,
Some drops of disappointment with delight;
When, rudely wakened from the dream of years,
You heard Velino thundering in your ears,
And fancy drooped,—until Romagna's wine

Stretched helpless on the burning sands I lie,
While scorching suns beat on me as they pass.
Day after day I watch the glaring sky,
A fiery furnace reared like burnished brass.

Spread like a tawny lion's shaggy hide,
The yellow plains reach hillocks red and brown;
See here the bones where dogs and men have died,
While imp-faced rocks in hideous hate looked down!

No living thing will come to share my grief,
Save when at night the famished coyotes howl,
Or, coiled at twilight by some withered sheaf,

In days long past no happier ship than I
Flung forth her empire's banner to the breeze;
No bolder bark withstood a stormy sky,
With fiercer ardor fought the foaming seas.

But then at last a day of evil came
On which we met the onslaught of the foe.
Oh, who shall tell the story of my shame,
My desolation, my disgrace, my woe?

My hull was splintered by their bursting shells,
My tottering turrets down the deck were hurled;
I heard my dying seamen's shrieks and yells,
As red flames through the black smoke waved and whirled.

The gulls are mad-in-love with the river
And the river unveils her face and smiles.
In her sleep-brooding eyes they mirror their shining wings.
She lies on silver pillows: the sun leans over her.
He warms and warms her, he kisses and kisses her.
There are sparks in her hair and she stirs in laughter.
Be careful, my beautiful waking one! you will catch on fire.
Wheeling and flying with the foam of the sea on their breasts
The ineffable mists of the sea clinging to their wild wings
Crying the rapture of the boundless ocean.

Year after year I wait, reposing here
Among the Faithful, by the Prophet blest;
A stranger now to grief, remorse and fear,
My one-time restless heart is wreathed in rest.

The years glide on, and still they find me free
From every care that dogs the feet of men;
No sun on desert sand, no storm at sea,
Shall ever come to vex my soul again.

No clouded skies on pages ashen-gray
Reflect heart-breaking annals of the earth;
The Judas-kisses all have passed away,
With all the madness that eclipsed our mirth.

In the profoundest Ocean
There is a rainbow shell,
It is always there, shining most stilly
Under the greatest storm waves
And under the happy little waves
That the old Greek called " ripples of laughter."
And you listen, the rainbow shell
Sings in the profoundest ocean —
It is always there, singing most silently

The higher that our spirits climb,
The more does truth appear a lie,
The more do things of Space and Time
Appear a rainbow in the sky —
A frail illusion of the sun
That fades and perishes when won.

Merely a rainbow, red and blue,
A thing that birds go flying through;
Yet on the rainbow's coloured arch
(Only perhaps six inches broad)
Armies of Hopes and Dreams can march
Up to the very Heart of God.

Be truth a lie,
Yet far and high,
In search of truth we still will fly;
For even on a rainbow rim

Into the world you sent her, mother,
Fashioned her body of coral and foam,
Combed a wave in her hair's warm smother,
And drove her away from home.

In the dark of the night she crept to the town
And under a doorway she laid her down,
The little blue child in the foam-fringed gown.

And never a sister and never a brother
To hear her call, to answer her cry.
Her face shone out from her hair's warm smother
Like a moonkin up in the sky.

She sold her corals; she sold her foam;
Her rainbow heart like a singing shell