• They christened my brother of old--

         And a saintly name he bears--

    They gave him his place to hold

      At the head of the belfry-stairs,

      Where the minister-towers stand

    And the breeding kestrels cry.

      Would I change with my brother a league inland?

    (Shoal! 'Ware shoal!) Not I!...

  •   Rattle of block and sheet--

    "Ready about-stand by!"

      Shall I ask them a fee ere they fetch the quay?

    (Shoal! 'Ware shoal!) Not I!


    I dip and I surge and I swing

      In the rip of the racing tide,

    By the gates of doom I sing,

      On the horns of death I ride.

      A ship-...

  • At the careless end of night

      I thrill to the nearing screw,

    I turn to the nearing light,

      And I call to the drowsy crew;

      And the mud boils foul and blue

    As the blind bow backs away.

      Do they give me their thanks if she clear the banks?

    (Shoal! 'Ware shoal!) Not they.
    ...

  • Belshazzar had a letter, —

    He never had but one ;

    Belshazzar's correspondent

    Concluded and begun

    In that immortal copy

    The conscience of us all

    Can read without its glasses

    On revelation's wall.

  • Don't you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt?

       Sweet Alice whose hair was so brown,

    Who wept with delight when you gave her a smile

       And trembled with fear at your frown?

    In the old churchyard in the valley, Ben Bolt,

       In a corner obscure and alone,

    They have fitted a slab of the granite so gray,...



  •  * * *[1]


         [Three Virgins at the Break of day

         "Whither, Young Man, hither away ? del.]

         "Alas for wo! alas for wo!

         They cry & tears for ever flow 5
    3   The one was cloth'd in...

  • You left me, sweet, two legacies, —

    A legacy of love

    A Heavenly Father would content,

    Had He the offer of ;


    You left me boundaries of pain

    Capacious as the sea,

    Between eternity and time,

    Your consciousness...

  • Bereaved of all, I went abroad —

    No less bereaved was I

    Upon a New Peninsula —

    The Grave preceded me —


    Obtained my Lodgings, ere myself —

    And when I sought my Bed —

    The Grave it was reposed upon

    The Pillow for my Head —


    I waked to find it first awake —

    I...

  • Bereavement in their death to feel

    Whom We have never seen —

    A Vital Kinsmanship import

    Our Soul and theirs — between —


    For Stranger — Strangers do not mourn —

    There be Immortal friends

    Whom Death see first — 'tis news of this

    That paralyze Ourselves —


    Who, vital only...