Short Poems

Oh, why wast thou my love?
And why was I thy lover?
I keep blue skies above:
But thou—dull earth for cover.
Then what had Fate to prove,
Save, oh!—the far remove
Of what for me was once thy love
From what remains thy lover?

Now the bright moon was hung on the pine,
And now it was slipped off from the tree.

How busy the full sails and the reefed
At sea in the winter shower!

What heat! Both stones and trees
Glare on the eye.

Ah! the firefly has perished
Pitifully on my hand.

Alas! I view this autumn's moon
Without my baby on my lap.

The raging bleak wind died away,
Till it remained as the sound of the sea.

This is Thy Natal Day, O Saviour dear,
The Day of Joy—to Christians full of bliss:
When nearer comes, with each revolving year,
The hour to spring to brighter worlds than this.

Though I have been a none-too-happy wife,
And now my children grow away from me,
Bringing to old age fresh anxiety,
I have been used—and to be used by life,
Even ill-used and broken utterly,
With every faith betrayed and trust abused,
Is a kinder lot than in security
To crumble coldly to the grave unused.

The wind
that for a time blew so wildly
has died down—
what blossoms it left,