Short Poems

The Brightest Star's the modestest ,
And more'n likely writes
His motto like the lightnin'-bug's —
Accordin' To His Lights.

While Butler, needy wretch, was yet alive,
No generous patron would a dinner give;

See him, when starved to death and turned to dust,
Presented with a monumental bust!
The poet's fate is here in emblem shown:
He asked for bread, and he received a stone.

Whether at doomsday (tell, ye reverend wise)
My friend Priapus with myself shall rise?

When your client's hopping mad,
Put his picture in the ad.
If he still should prove refractory
Add a picture of his factory.

When winds go organing through the pines
On hill and headland, darkly gleaming,
Meseems I hear sonorous lines
Of Iliads that the woods are dreaming.

When the sun is shining overhead
'Tis nice to make a leafy bed
Deep in the shady wood;
To lie and gaze towards the sky
Peeping through the leaves on high,
Above the shady wood.

When the sea comes in at Horsey Gap
Without any previous warning,
A swan shall build its rushy nest
On the roof of the Swan at Horning.

And a bald headed crow, contented and merry,
Shall feast on the corpses that float by the ferry.

When the hurricane unfolds
Its fierce accordion of winds,
On the tip of its toes,
Agile dancer, it sweeps whirling
Over the carpeted surface of the sea
With the scattered branches of the palm.

When the elephant's-ear in the park
Shrivelled in frost,
And the leaves on the paths
Ran like rats,
Your lamp-light fell
On shining pillows,
Of sea-shades and sky-shades,
Like umbrellas in Java.

When quiet in my room I sit,
Thy Book be my companion still;
My joy Thy sayings to repeat,
Talk o'er the records of Thy will,
And search the oracles divine,
Till every heartfelt word is mine.