Short Poems

The ship crept silent up the sea,
And came—
You cannot understand
How fair she was, how sudden she
Had sprung, full grown, to womanhood.
How gracious, yet how proud and grand;
How glorified, yet fresh and free,
How human, yet how more than good.

How proud she was! How darkly fair!
How full of faith, of love, of strength!
Her calm, proud eyes! Her great hair's length,—
Her long, strong, tumbled, careless hair,
Half curled and knotted anywhere,—
By brow or breast, or cheek or chin,
For love to trip and tangle in!

An Indian woman cautious crept
About the land the while it slept,
The relic of her perished race.
She wore rich, rudely-fashioned bands
Of gold above her bony hands;
She hissed hot curses on the place!

The Andalusian merchant, that returns
Laden with cochineal and china dishes,
Reports in Spain how strangely Fogo burns
Amidst an ocean full of flying fishes:
These things seem wondrous, yet more wondrous I,
Whose heart with fear doth freeze, with love doth fry.

Her hands still clasped as if in prayer,
Sweet prayer set to silentness;
Her sun-browned throat uplifted, bare
And beautiful.
Her eager face
Illumed with love and tenderness,
And all her presence gave such grace,
That she seemed more than mortal, fair.

I will go to gaze at the moon
From the deserted castle-courts of Fushimi.

The Goops they lick their fingers,
—And the Goops they lick their knives;
They spill their broth on the table-cloth;
—Oh, they live untidy lives.
The Goops they talk while eating,
—And loud and fast they chew,
So that is why I am glad that I
—Am not a Goop. Are you?

This is mint and here are three pinks
I have brought you, Mother.
They are wet with rain
And shining with it.
The pinks smell like more of them
In a blue vase:
The mint smells like summer
In many gardens.

The official's little son—
how fast he's learned to open
and close his fist!

Forgive me, fair One, nor resent
The Lines to you I lately sent.
They seem, as if your Form you priz'd,
And ev'ry other Gift despis'd:
When a discerning Eye may find,
Your greatest Beauty's in your Mind.