A Boy's Song

Where the pools are bright and deep,
Where the grey trout lies asleep,
Up the river and over the lea,
That's the way for Billy and me.

Where the blackbird sings the latest,
Where the hawthorn blooms the sweetest,
Where the nestlings chirp and flee,
That's the way for Billy and me.

Where the mowers mow the cleanest,
Where the hay lies thick and greenest,
There to track the homeward bee,
That's the way for Billy and me.

Where the hazel bank is steepest,


A Bouquet

Take first a Cowslip, then an Asphodel,
A bridal Rose, some snowy Orange flowers;
A Lily next, and by its spotless bell
Place the bright Iris, darling of the showers;
Set gold Nasturtiums, Elder blooms between,
And Heart's-ease to the Orchis marry sweetly;
Then with red Pinks, and slips of Evergreen,
You will possess -- all folded up discreetly --
In one bouquet, that none but you may know,
The name I love beyond all names below.


A Birthday

"Aug." 10, 1911.

Full moon to-night; and six and twenty years
Since my full moon first broke from angel spheres!
A year of infinite love unwearying ---
No circling seasons, but perennial spring!
A year of triumph trampling through defeat,
The first made holy and the last made sweet
By this same love; a year of wealth and woe,
Joy, poverty, health, sickness --- all one glow
In the pure light that filled our firmament
Of supreme silence and unbarred extent,
Wherein one sacrament was ours, one Lord,


A Ballade of Home

LET others prate of Greece and Rome,
And towns where they may never be,
The muse should wander nearer home.
My country is enough for me;
Her wooded hills that watch the sea,
Her inland miles of springing corn,
At Macedon or Barrakee—
I love the land where I was born.
On Juliet smile the autumn stars
And windswept plains by Winchelsea,
In summer on their sandy bars
Her rivers loiter languidly.
Where singing waters fall and flee
The gullied ranges dip to Lorne


6th April 1651 L'Amitie To Mrs. M. Awbrey

Soule of my soule! my Joy, my crown, my friend!
A name which all the rest doth comprehend;
How happy are we now, whose sols are grown,
By an incomparable mixture, One:
Whose well acquainted minds are not as neare
As Love, or vows, or secrets can endeare.
I have no thought but what's to thee reveal'd,
Nor thou desire that is from me conceal'd.
Thy heart locks up my secrets richly set,
And my breast is thy private cabinet.
Thou shedst no teare but what but what my moisture lent,
And if I sigh, it is thy breath is spent.


What Look hath She

What look hath she,
   What majestie,
That must so high approve her?
   What graces move
   That I so love,
That I so greatly love her?

   No majestie
   But Truth hath She;
Thoughts sweet and gracious move her;
   That straight approve
   My heart to love,
And all my life to love her!


Resurgam

(Autumn Song)

   Chill breezes moaning are
   Where leaves hang yellow:
   O'er the grey hills afar
   Flies the last swallow;
To come again, my love, to come again
   Blithe with the summer.
But Ah! the long months ere we welcome then
   That bright new comer.

   Cold lie the flowers and dead
   Where leaves are falling.
   Meekly they bowed and sped
   At Autumn's calling.
To come again, my love, to come again
   Blithe with the swallow.


The Old Maid

I saw her in a Broadway car,
The woman I might grow to be;
I felt my lover look at her
And then turn suddenly to me.
Her hair was dull and drew no light,
And yet its color was as mine;
Her eyes were strangely like my eyes,
Tho' love had never made them shine.

Her body was a thing grown thin,
Hungry for love that never came;
Her soul was frozen in the dark,
Unwarmed forever by love's flame.

I felt my lover look at her
And then turn suddenly to me –


Oh You Are Coming

Oh you are coming, coming, coming,
How will hungry Time put by the hours till then? --
But why does it anger my heart to long so
For one man out of the world of men?

Oh I would live in myself only
And build my life lightly and still as a dream --
Are not my thoughts clearer than your thoughts
And colored like stones in a running stream?

Now the slow moon brightens in heaven,
The stars are ready, the night is here --
Oh why must I lose myself to love you,
My dear?


I Have Loved Hours at Sea

I have loved hours at sea, gray cities,
The fragile secret of a flower,
Music, the making of a poem
That gave me heaven for an hour;

First stars above a snowy hill,
Voices of people kindly and wise,
And the great look of love, long hidden,
Found at last in meeting eyes.

I have loved much and been loved deeply --
Oh when my spirit's fire burns low,
Leave me the darkness and the stillness,
I shall be tired and glad to go.


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