Once on a time I used to dream
— Strange spirits moved about my way,
And I might catch a vagrant gleam,
— A glint of pixy or of fay;
Their lives were mingled with my own,
— So far they roamed, so near they drew;
And when I from a child had grown,
— I woke — and found my dream was true.

For one is clad in coat of fur,
— And one is decked with feathers gay;
Another, wiser, will prefer
— A sober suit of Quaker gray:
This one's your servant from his birth,
— And that a Princess you must please,

I
Once on a time, as old stories rehearse,
A friar would needs show his talent in Latin;
But was sorely put to't in the midst of a verse,
Because he could find no word to come pat in.
Then all in the place
He left a void space,
And so went to bed in a desperate case.
When behold the next morning, a wonderful riddle,
Be found it was strangely filled up in the middle.
CHO[RUS]
Let censuring critics then think what they list on't,
Who would not write verses with such an assistant.
II

This put me the friar into an amazement;

Once on a time, a Monarch, tired with whooping,
Whipping and spurring,
Happy in worrying
A poor, defenceless, harmless buck
(The horse and rider wet as muck),
From his high confidence and wisdom stooping,
Entered, through curiosity, a cot
Where sat a poor Old Woman and her pot.

The wrinkled, blear-eyed, good old granny,
In this same cot, illumed by many a cranny,
Had finished apple dumplings for her pot.
In tempting row the naked dumplings lay,
When, lo! the Monarch, in his usual way,

ON HIS RETURN FROM SOUTH AMERICA

AFTER FIFTEEN YEARS DEVOTED TO CATALOGUING THE STARS OF THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE

Once more Orion and the sister Seven
Look on thee from the skies that hailed thy birth, —
How shall we welcome thee, whose home was heaven,
From thy celestial wanderings back to earth?

Science has kept her midnight taper burning
To greet thy coming with its vestal flame;
Friendship has murmured, " When art thou returning? "

1. Once more, O Lord, thy sign shall be Upon the heavens displayed,
And earth and its inhabitants Be terribly afraid.
2. The terrors of that awful day, O who can understand?
Or who abide, when thou in wrath Shall lift thy holy hand?
For not in weakness clad thou com'st, Our woes, our sins to bear,
The earth shall quake, the sea shall roar, The sun in heaven grow pale;
But girt with all thy Father's might, His judgment to declare.
But thou hast sworn, and wilt not change, Thy faithful shall not fail.

3. Then grant us, Saviour, so to pass

Once more in misted April
The world is growing green,
Along the winding river
The plumey willows lean.

Beyond the sweeping meadows
The looming mountains rise,
Like battlements of dreamland
Against the brooding skies.

In every wooded valley
The buds are breaking through,
As though the heart of all things
No languor ever knew.

The golden wings and bluebirds
Call to their heavenly choirs.
The pines are blued and drifted
With smoke of brushwood fires.

And in my sister's garden
Where little breezes run,

Once in the dear dead days beyond recall, When on the world the mists began to fall,
Out of the dreams that rose in happy throng Low to our hearts Love sung an old sweet song;
And in the dusk where fell the firelight gleam, Softly it wove itself into our dream.
Just a song at twilight, when the lights are low, And the flick'ring shadows
softly come and go, Tho' the heart he weary, sad the day and long,
Still to us at twilight comes Love's old song, comes Love's old sweet song.
Even today we hear Love's song of yore, Deep in our hearts it dwells forever more

ONCE IN P ERSIA reigned a king,
Who upon his signet ring
Graved a maxim true and wise,
Which, if held before his eyes,
Gave him counsel at a glance
Fit for every change and chance.
Solemn words, and these are they;
" Even this shall pass away. "

Trains of camels through the sand
Brought him gems from Samarcand;
Fleets of galleys through the seas
Brought him pearls to match with these;
But he counted not his gain
Treasures of the mine or main;
" What is wealth? " the king would say;
" Even this shall pass away. "

Once in a lifetime, we may see the veil
Tremble and lift, that hides symbolic things;
The Spirit's vision, when the senses fail,
Sweeps the weird meaning that the outlook brings.

Deep in the midst of turmoil, it may be —
A crowded street, a forum, or a field, —
The soul inverts the telescope to see
To-day's events in future's years revealed.

Back from the present, let us look at Rome:
Behold, what Cato meant, what Brutus said,
Hark! the Athenians welcome Cimon home!
How clear they are, those glimpses of the dead!

(The fantasia of a fallen gentleman on a cold, bitter night)

Once, in finesse of fiddles found I ecstasy,
In the flash of gold heels on the hard pavement.
Now see I
That warmth's the very stuff of poesy.
Oh, God, make small
The old star-eaten blanket of the sky,
That I may fold it round me and in comfort lie.