Short Poems

The factions of the great ones call,
To side with them, the Commons all.

The Power that lifts the leaf above
And sends the root below,
Sustains the heart in brother-love
And makes it heavenward grow.

For Iustice I'll appeale your father's eare
But crie both mercie, & craue pardon here.

When other pens and other lips
Their tales of mirth shall tell,
When newer quirks and newer quips
Your megrims shall dispel,
There may, perhaps, in such a day
Some recollection be
Of one—. But no, I'm free to say
You'll not remember me.

It seems the heavy rains of May
Have left the “Shining Hall” untouched.

The grey dust runs on the ground like a mouse,
Over the doorstep and into the house,
Under the bedsteads and tables and chairs,
Up to the rooms at the top of the stairs,
Down to the cellar, across the brick floor—
There! It is off again by the back door!
Never a mousetrap can catch the grey mouse
Who keeps the brooms busy all over the house!

You hear but the moans that break
On the rocks at your feet—but hark!
Perchance through the dreary dark
A cry from a drifting wreck!

Between our folding lips
God slips
An embryon life, and goes;
And this becomes your rose.
We love, God makes: in our sweet mirth
God spies occasion for a birth.
Then is it His, or is it ours?
I know not—He is fond of flowers.

Autumn deepening—
my neighbor
how does he live, I wonder?

D ARDANIAN fields I sing, and Ilium's towers;
Sad source of woe to Græcia's martal powers.