• 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...

  • This is a breath of summer wind
      That comes—we know not how—that goes
    As softly,—leaving us behind,
      Pleased with a smell of vine and rose.

    Poet, shall this be all thy word?
      Blow on us with a bolder breeze,
    Until we rise, as having heard
      The sob, the song of far-off seas.

    Blow in thy shell until thou draw,
      From...