Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

She charmed him with her charming eye;
To know its luster was to die,
Or feed forever on its light.
She bore him to her mountain height;
With wine-sweet lips she kissed to rest
The thousand longings in his breast.

She ringed him with her glittering coils;
Her flattering words were soft as oils,
All swam before his drunken sight;
He felt his beauty and his might,
And cursed the darkness as he hurled
Defiance at the crouching world.

He did not know her treachery;
But thought her tightened grasp to be
The clasp of love—O! heavy fate!
She thrust him in the face of hate
With all the venom in her born,
And slew him with her tongue of scorn.

DESIRE.

I would the Fates were busier
A shaping out my name and story.
It seems not like a haggard Fate
To hesitate, and hesitate;
But they'll demur if they prefer,
And far away is fame and glory.

Perhaps delay is profiting,
And disappointments shape a moral;
But age cares not for sweet applause,
For age is wise with “says and saws.”
With merry spring I love to sing
And with my youth I seek my laurel.

I cannot choose experience
To lead me faltering and jaded,
While all the blossom of my life
Is wasting in the fretful strife,
Till reaching hence that height intense
I find the myrtle plucked or faded.

No wreath of honor dignifies
The silver hairs, nor all endeavor
Finds any mark of royalty
However rich the trophy be.
Now I would rise and seize the prize,
Then rest forever and forever.

COMPENSATION.

What if my tender roots may haply coil
In a deep mellow soil,
Wherein is found no weed
That killeth all things with its harmful greed,
But only there is nourished mine own reed—
To rear its slender crest
In every hue of richest blossom dressed?

If in the sunny mazes of my leaves
The crafty spider weaves—
Or in my fairest bloom
Some worm hath stole, where in delicious gloom
It lies and fattens in its honeyed tomb—
What shall it profit me,
The outward show so fair, the prize I seem to be?

Still, I may 'scape the worm, the spider's net;
No cursed blight may set
Its dangerous touch anew

Upon my frailest buds, in vile mildew;
My faded flowers the Autumn winds may strew;
But, after all the strife,
If I have borne no fruit, or seed, what use was life?

UNREST.

O! vestal lilies, white and still,
Thy golden cressets newly trim;
O! wine-tipt tulip globes now spill
Thy orient oils upon the flame;
My heavy woe I may not name,
But woe were less if thou wouldst fill
Each golden cresset's rim—
For I may burn within the fire
All bitterness, but what is true
Endures the ordeal of the pyre,
And swathes itself in gossamer dew.

O! summer wind return again
And sing my little ills to rest;
Distill thy balm, delightful rain,
Through various currents of the air;
The cross is heavy that I bear;
But thou mayest lull the vexing pain
And breathe a quiet in my breast.

Peace, weary heart! O! tongue be mute!
Voluptuous goddess, prithee, weep
Thy golden tears, and soft salute
Yon star, my soul desireth sleep.

A RHYME OF LIFE.

If life be as a flame that death doth kill;
Burn little candle lit for me,
With a pure spark, that I may rightly see
To word my song and utterly
God's plan fulfill.

If life be as a flower that blooms and dies;
Forbid the cunning frost that slays
With Judas-kiss, and trusting love betrays:
Forever may my song of praise
Untainted rise.

If life be as a voyage, or foul, or fair:
O! bid me not my banners furl
For adverse gale, or wave in angry whirl,
Till I have found the gates of pearl
And anchored there.