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The poems of Trumbull Stickney

Stickney, Trumbull (1874-1904)

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[section]
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I DRAMATIC VERSES
  
[dedication]
  
KALYPSO
  
ONCE
  
IN THE PAST
  
ONEIROPOLOS
  
LUCRETIUS
  
AGE IN YOUTH
  
IN SUMMER
  
IN AMPEZZO
  
MNEMOSYNE
  
LODOVICO MARTELLI
  
DOLOROSA
  
PITY
  
SONG
  
RALSTON
  
DRIFTWOOD
  
REQUIESCAM
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ERIDE
  
[prologue]
 1. 
I
 2. 
II
 3. 
III
 4. 
IV
 5. 
V
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SONNETS
  
[You say, Columbus with his argosies]
  
[They say that Cleopatra who of yore]
  
[They lived enamoured of the lovely moon]
  
ON RODIN'S “L'ILLUSION, SŒUR D'ICARE”
 1. 
[I My friend, who in this March unkind, uncouth]
 2. 
[II Your image walks not in my common way]
 3. 
[III Were you called home and I were left to grief]
  
IN A CHURCHYARD
  
[When I hereafter shall recover thee]
  
[Tho' inland far with mountains prisoned round]
  
ON SOME SHELLS FOUND INLAND
  
[Tho' lack of laurels and of wreaths not one]
  
[Live blindly and upon the hour. The Lord]
  
[Be still. The Hanging Gardens were a dream]
  
ON THE CONCERT
  
[The melancholy year is dead with rain]
  
[As a sad man, when evenings grayer grow]
  
[He said: “If in his image I was made]
  
LAKEWARD
  
PROMETHEUS PYRPHOROS [1900]
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II FRAGMENTS OF A DRAMA ON THE LIFE OF THE EMPEROR JULIAN
 1. 
ACT I
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ACT II
 1. 
I
 2. 
II
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III LATER LYRICS
 1. 
[I Listen! As though from other times and days]
 2. 
[II I saw how that a painter, given o'er]
 3. 
[III With long black wings an angel standing by]
 4. 
[IV You are to me the full vermilion rose]
 5. 
[V The trees and shrubbery glimmer]
 6. 
[VI A glad little rift, so shy]
 7. 
[VII I love thee longer and I love thee most]
 8. 
[VIII Dear and rich as a dawn of summer]
 9. 
[IX And, the last day being come, Man stood alone]
 10. 
X DEDICATION
 11. 
XI A FLOWER
 12. 
XII A STONE
 13. 
XIII PARDON
 14. 
XIV SERVICE
 15. 
XV CHESTNUTS IN NOVEMBER
 16. 
XVI FIDELITY
 17. 
[XVII With thy two eyes look on me once again]
 18. 
[XVIII When bye and bye relenting you regret]
 19. 
XIX LONELINESS
 20. 
[XX As pilgrims, when the ways of winter ope]
 21. 
[XXI Quiet after the rain of morning]
 22. 
[XXII If tho' alone I scarce do sigh]
 23. 
[XXIII Grudge not that I so long for thee]
 24. 
[XXIV Spirits that might have been]
 25. 
XXV SEPARATION
 26. 
XXVI AT SAINTE-MARGUERITE
 27. 
[XXVII I dreamed. Aye, it was very dark]
 28. 
[XXVIII Leave him now quiet by the way]
 29. 
XXIX AN ATHENIAN GARDEN
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XXX SONNETS FROM GREECE
  
SUNIUM
  
MT. LYKAION
  
NEAR HELIKON
  
ELEUSIS
  
MT. IDA
 31. 
XXXI SIX O'CLOCK
 32. 
XXXII IN A CITY GARDEN
 4. 
IV A DRAMATIC SCENE
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V JUVENILIA
 1. 
I ART IN MAN
 2. 
II MUSIC
 3. 
III NIGHT
 4. 
IV EVENING
 5. 
V AGE AND YOUTH
 6. 
[VI This is the nursling of an hundred years]
 7. 
[VII Tho', moored along the quiet quay on some]
 8. 
VIII THE DEATH OF AISCHYLOS
 9. 
[IX My note is highest of them all]
 10. 
[X When you've averaged emotion, found where Nature goes to school]
 11. 
XI ODE
 12. 
[XII 'T was yet an hour to dawn. Revengeful storm]
 13. 
XIII COLOGNE CATHEDRAL
 14. 
[XIV When by you lies my broken heart, and I]
 15. 
[XV Now the lovely moon is wilted]
 16. 
[XVI I know where all the singers hide]
 17. 
[XVII Hold still, my brain! My temples burst! Shall e'er]
 18. 
XVIII NIMIUM PASSUS
 19. 
[XIX Spring is come. From the wind lightly dissipate feathers of mist that an upland exhales]
 20. 
XX IN AMPEZZO
 21. 
[XXI If, in the night and madness of thy mind]
 22. 
[XXII Henceforward I no longer shall be known]
 23. 
XXIII A LETTER
 24. 
[XXIV My life shall count by the smile and tear]
 25. 
XXV You'll say when here again after it all
 26. 
XXVI This is the violin. If you remember—
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VI FRAGMENTS
 1. 
[I The Autumn's done; they have the golden corn in]
 2. 
[II She sat under the naked bough]
 3. 
III FRAGMENT OF AN ODE FOR GREEK LIBERTY
 4. 
[IV My Ludovico, it is sad]
 5. 
[V The weakened eyes regain their sight]
 6. 
[VI And I stood ringed about with marble dreams]
 7. 
[VII 'T is said that hearts are won, at length]
 8. 
[VIII We learn by suffering and we teach by pity]
 9. 
[IX I hear a river thro' the valley wander]
 10. 
[X Nay, take it all in all, the human sort]
 11. 
[XI The passions that we fought with and subdued]
 12. 
[XII As one who loving beyond words will bring]
 13. 
[XIII Teased by the burden of this little sky]
 14. 
[XIV If with my life I lifted from thy head]
 15. 
[XV The immortal mixes with mortality]
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XVI FRAGMENT OF A DRAMA CALLED “THE CARDINAL PLAY”
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SHORTER FRAGMENTS FROM “THE CARDINAL PLAY”
 1. 
I
 2. 
II
 3. 
III
 4. 
IV
 5. 
V
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XVII “DRAMATIC FRAGMENTS
 1. 
I
 2. 
II BLINDNESS AND DEAFNESS
 3. 
III THE SOUL OF TIME
 4. 
IV
 5. 
V

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39

PITY

An old light smoulders in her eye.
There! she looks up. They grow and glow
Like mad laughs of a rhapsody
That flickers out in woe.
An old charm slips into her sighs,
An old grace sings about her hand.
She bends: it 's musically wise.
I cannot understand.
Her voice is strident; but a spell
Of fluted whisper silkens in—
The lost heart in a moss-grown bell,
Faded—but sweet—but thin.
She bows like waves—waves near the shore.
Her hair is in a vulgar knot—
Lovely, dark hair, whose curves deplore
Something she 's well forgot.
She must have known the sun, the moon,
On heaven's warm throat star-jewels strung—
It 's late. The gas-lights flicker on.
Young, only in years, but young!
One might remind her, say the street
Is dark and vile now day is done.
But would she care, she fear to meet—
But there she goes—is gone.
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