You gave me roses, love, last night,
When the sea was blue and the skies were bright;
And the earth was aglow with a golden light
When you gave me roses, love, last night.

Lilies I lay by your side to-day,
And your face—it is colder and whiter than they;
And I linger and listen and wonder and pray,
As I bring you lilies to-day.

Adown the pretty purling stream
The little Loves may loll and dream;
And please, and prune themselves with care,
And fancy Virtue lodges there.
The soft Affections thus, and strong,
Adown life's current glide along;
And all-appeas'd and uncontroul'd,
Awhile their equal measure hold
Till sailing farther on the deep,
Or mounting Virtue's lofty steep,
The pretty system sinks away,
The little loves, and smiles decay.
Unnumber'd waves and storms we find
To raise—not to depress the mind,
The conscious mind, which dares endure,

He is a heart,
An acorn from the oakwood.
He is young.
A kiss for him!

Why should the living need my oil?
I see them, and their eyes are blest.
No. For those others I must toil:
I toil to set the dead at rest.

Yet when I watch in solemn tides
The drifting crowds, each life a ghost,
I mourn them, for their truth abides;
Nor is one loved, till he is lost.

Why should the living need my oil?
I see them, and their eyes are blest.
No. For those others I must toil:
I toil to set the dead at rest.

Yet when I watch in solemn tides
The drifting crowds, each life a ghost,

I think I should have loved you presently,
And given in earnest words I flung in jest;
And lifted honest eyes for you to see,
And caught your hand against my cheek and breast;
And all my pretty follies flung aside
That won you to me, and beneath your gaze,
Naked of reticence and shorn of pride,
Spread like a chart my little wicked ways.
I, that had been to you, had you remained,
But one more waking from a recurrent dream,
Cherish no less the certain stakes I gained,
And walk your memory's halls, austere, supreme,

Not the sharp torture of the critic's pen,
The curse of genius in our days, tho' scorn'd,
Nor full fore-knowledge of the ban which men
Would set upon thee, Lady, have suborn'd
Thee from the simple truth; nor that gay crown
Of dry gilt leaves and roses overblown,
Which intellectual cliques delight to give
To wits and scribes of drawing-room renown,
And they, debased, on bended knees receive,
Weighs 'gainst the awful claims of that which you believe.

What you assert the critics will deny,
What you deplore pronounce eternal law,

I WOULD not have you mourn too much,
When I am lying low,—
Your grief would grieve me even then,
Should your tears flow.

But only plant above my grave
One little sprig of rue;
Then find yourself a fairer love,
But not more true.

The summer winds will come and go
Above me as I lie;
And if I think at all, my dear,
As they pass by,

I shall remember the old love,
With all its bliss and bane,—
Though Life nor Death can bring me back
The old, sweet pain.

Mute is thy wild harp, now, O Bard sublime!
Who, amid Scotia's mountain solitude,
Great Nature taught to “build the lofty rhyme,”
And even beneath the daily pressure, rude,
Of labouring Poverty, thy generous blood,
Fired with the love of freedom[.]—Not subdued
Wert thou by thy low fortune: But a time
Like this we live in, when the abject chime
Of echoing Parasite is best approved,
Was not for thee [.]—Indignantly is fled
Thy noble Spirit; and no longer moved
By all the ills o'er which thine heart has bled,

If high excess of unrelenting smart
Enforce not words to fail and thoughts to faint;
My love would now convince both tongue and heart
To say farewell unto my sweetest saint.
But while affection would my woes reveal,
And say unto my dearest heart farewell,
My senses are so suffocate with care,
They sigh, they groan, then say nothing but “fair.”

Then fairest fair, read in my sighs and tears
The secret anguish of thy dying slave,
Who, for the love unto thy worth he bears,
Hath consecrate his soul unto the grave;

Flowers are for the earth
And children for the sky.
When once they've gone to look on God,
They love it best on high.
Then let the bells ring out and say:
“One angel more in heaven to-day.”