Short Poems

How long shall we gaze upon
the blossoms and the moon?

Morning glories abloom
on a wattled fence, dew laden
in the light of dawn.

Still though the one I sing,
(One, yet of contradictions made,) I dedicate to Nationality,
I leave in him revolt, (O latent right of insurrection! O quenchless, indispensable fire!)

In some far-off
cleft of the rock
let me live alone,
thinking no longer of outsiders' eyes,
thinking only of my love

I think of past times,
so swift
in their vanishing,
the present soon to follow—
dew on the morning-glory

The three-foot-long sword that can split a feather
I've hidden in the Great Dipper.
In the great void no trace of clouds,
Now you see its sharp point!

When I take my zither
Sobscomefirst (before I begin to play).
Can it be that
In the belly of the zither
My mistress is hiding!

Let me not live when thou art no more here!
For when thine eyes are closed in final rest
My weary head shall lie upon thy breast
Pillowed in perfect peace. I shall not fear
The hour when Death claims thee, for I shall go
With thee thro'out the gates of Paradise,
And in the Promised Land twain souls shall know
The happy heaven of each other's eyes!

I gave to Hope a watch of mine: but he
An anchor gave to me.
Then an old prayer-book I did present:
And he an optic sent.
With that I gave a vial full of tears:
But he a few green ears.
Ah loiterer! I'll no more, no more I'll bring:
I did expect a ring.

Thus may we see by folly of[t] the wise
Stumble and fall into fool's paradise,
For jocund wit of force must jangling be;
Wit must have his will, and so had he:
Wit must have his will, yet parting of the fray,
Wit was enjoin'd to carry the fool away.

Qui color albus erat, nunc est contrarius albo.

O that I knew how all thy lights combine, And the configurations of their gloriy! Seeing not only how each verse doth shine,
But all the constellations of the story.
This verse marks that, and both do make a motion Unto a third, that ten leaves off doth lie: Then as dispersed herbs do watch a potion,
These three make up some Christian's destiny:
Such are thy secrets, which my life makes good, And comments on thee: for in ev’rything Thy words do finde me out, and parallels bring,