The whelp that nipped its mother’s dug in turning from her breast,
And smacked its lusty lips and built its own lair in the West,
Has stretched its limbs and looked about and roared across the sea:
“Oh, mother, I did bite thee hard, but still thou lovest me!”
She lifts her head and listens, as waking from a dream,
Her great jaw set, her claws outspread...
Leap to the highest height of spring,
And trill thy sweetest note,
Bird of the heavenly plumes and twinkling wing
And silver-tonëd throat!
Sing, while the maple’s deepest root
Thrills with a pulse of fire
That lights its buds. Blow, blow thy tender flute,
Thy reed of rich desire!
Breathe in thy syrinx Freedom’s breath...
Those were good times, in olden days,
Of which the poet has his dreams,
When gods beset the woodland ways,
And lay in wait by all the streams.
One could be sure of something then
Severely simple, simply grand,
Or keenly, subtly sweet, as when
Venus and Love went hand in hand.
Now I would give (such is my need)...
We were twin brothers, tall and hale,
Glad wanderers over hill and dale.
We stood within the twilight shade
Of pines that rimmed a Southern glade.
He said: “Let ’s settle, if we can,
Which of us is the stronger man.
“We ’ll try a flight shot, high and good,
Across the green glade toward the wood.”
And so we bent in sheer...
What bird is that, with voice so sweet,
Sings to the sun from yonder tree?
What girl is that so slim and fleet,
Comes through the cane her love to meet?
Foli zo-zo, sing merrily.
The pretty girl she comes to me!
What wind is that upon the cane?
What perfume from a far-off rose
Fills me with dreams? What strange, vague...
Old soldiers true, ah, them all men can trust,
Who fought, with conscience clear, on either side;
Who bearded Death and thought their cause was just;
Their stainless honor cannot be denied;
All patriots they beyond the farthest doubt;
Ring it and sing it up and down the land,
And let no voice dare answer it with sneers,
Or shut its...
Where hints of racy sap and gum
Out of the old dark forest come;
Where birds their beaks like hammers wield,
And pith is pierced, and bark is peeled;
Where the green walnut’s outer rind
Gives precious bitterness to the wind;—
There lurks the sweet creative power,
As lurks the honey in the flower.
In winter’s bud that...
Those were good times, in olden days,
Of which the poet has his dreams,
When gods beset the woodland ways,
And lay in wait by all the streams.
One could be sure of something then
Severely simple, simply grand,
Or keenly, subtly sweet, as when
Venus and Love went hand in hand.
Now I would give (such is my need)...
