When youth was lord of my unchallenged fate,
And time seemed but the vassal of my will,
I entertainëd certain guests of state—
The great of older days, who, faithful still,
Have kept with me the pact my youth had made.
And I remember how one galleon rare
From the far distance of a time long dead
Came on the wings of a fair-fortuned air...
I saw thy beauty in its high estate
Of perfect empire, where at set of sun
In the cool twilight of thy lucent leaves
The dewy freshness told that day was done.
Hast thou no gift beyond thine ivory cone’s
Surpassing loveliness? Art thou not near—
More near than we—to nature’s silentness;
Is it not voiceful to thy finer ear?
Death ’s but one more to-morrow. Thou art gray
With many a death of many a yesterday.
O yearning heart that lacked the athlete’s force
And, stumbling, fell upon the beaten course,
And looked, and saw with ever glazing eyes
Some lower soul that seemed to win the prize!
Lo, Death, the just, who comes to all alike,
Life’s sorry scales of...
Four straight brick walls, severely plain,
A quiet city square surround;
A level space of nameless graves,—
The Quakers’ burial-ground.
In gown of gray, or coat of drab,
They trod the common ways of life,
With passions held in sternest leash,
And hearts that knew not strife.
To yon grim meeting-house they fared,...
There is no dearer lover of lost hours
Than I.
I can be idler than the idlest flowers;
More idly lie
Than noonday lilies languidly afloat,
And water pillowed in a windless moat.
And I can be
Stiller than some gray stone
That hath no motion known.
It seems to me
That my still idleness...
Good master, you and I were born
In “Teacup days” of hoop and hood,
And when the silver cue hung down,
And toasts were drunk, and wine was good;
When kin of mine (a jolly brood)
From sideboards looked, and knew full well
What courage they had given the beau,
How generous made the blushing belle.
Ah me! what gossip could I...
Four straight brick walls, severely plain,
A quiet city square surround;
A level space of nameless graves,—
The Quakers’ burial-ground.
In gown of gray, or coat of drab,
They trod the common ways of life,
With passions held in sternest leash,
And hearts that knew not strife.
To yon grim meeting-house they fared,...
