William Winter

  • Fairy spirits of the breeze—
    Frailer nothing is than these.
    Fancies born we know not where—
    In the heart or in the air;
    Wandering echoes blown unsought
    From far crystal peaks of thought;
    Shadows, fading at the dawn,
    Ghosts of feeling dead...

  • Sweet bell of Stratford, tolling slow,
    In summer gloaming’s golden glow,
    I hear and feel thy voice divine,
    And all my soul responds to thine.

    As now I hear thee, even so,
    My Shakespeare heard thee long ago,
    When lone by Avon’s pensive stream...

  • I
    white sail upon the ocean verge,
      Just crimsoned by the setting sun,
    Thou hast thy port beyond the surge,
      Thy happy homeward course to run,
    And wingëd hope, with heart of fire,
    To gain the bliss of thy desire.

    I watch thee till the...

  • And oh, to think the sun can shine,
      The birds can sing, the flowers can bloom,
    And she, whose soul was all divine,
      Be darkly mouldering in the tomb:

    That o’er her head the night-wind sighs,
      And the sad cypress droops and moans;
    That night...

  • Out in the dark it throbs and glows—
    The wide, wild sea, that no man knows!
    The wind is chill, the surge is white,
    And I must sail that sea to-night.

    You shall not sail! The breakers roar
    On many a mile of iron shore,
    The waves are livid in their...

  • Beneath the midnight moon of May,
      Through dusk on either hand,
    One sheet of silver spreads the bay,
      One crescent jet the land;
    The black ships mirrored in the stream
      Their ghostly tresses shake—
    When will the dead world cease to dream?...

  • He knelt beside her pillow, in the dead watch of the night,
    And he heard her gentle breathing, but her face was still and white,
    And on her poor, wan cheek a tear told how the heart can weep,
    And he said, “My love was weary—God bless her! she ’s asleep.”

    He...

  • He loves not well whose love is bold!
      I would not have thee come too nigh:
    The sun’s gold would not seem pure gold
      Unless the sun were in the sky;
    To take him thence and chain him near
    Would make his beauty disappear.

    He keeps his state,—keep...