• Now summer finds her perfect prime;
      Sweet blows the wind from western calms;
    On every bower red roses climb;
      The meadows sleep in mingled balms.
    Nor stream, nor bank the wayside by,
      But lilies float and daisies throng;
    Nor space of blue and sunny sky
      That is not cleft with soaring song.
    O flowery morns, O tuneful eves,...

  • His face is truly of the Roman mould,
      He bears within the heart of Cato, too;
    Although his look may seem severe and cold,
      He never would be false to truth or you.

    And deepest feeling hides about the mouth;
      His soul-wind blows not always from the north,
    But sometimes also from the gentle south,
      And then, like flowers, the tender...

  • Oh, frame some little word for me
    None else shall ever hear or see,—
    Something my soul can call her own,
    When suddenly she feels alone;
    Something that she can take away
    When God shall draw the veil of clay;
    Something that thou wilt know her by
    Among the billions of the sky;
    Something no other soul will fit
    Save hers for...

  • I do affirm that thou hast saved the race
    As much as thou hast ever made it lose:
    Men of quick action may thy name abuse,
    But the world’s life and theirs attest thy grace.
    An hour of thee doth sometimes turn the face
    Of men and kingdoms, bidding them refuse
    What, chosen last, it had been death to choose:
    Through thee alone, they missed...

  • As dyed in blood the streaming vines appear,
      While long and low the wind about them grieves:
    The heart of Autumn must have broken here,
      And poured its treasure out upon the leaves.

  • This bears the seal of immortality,
      For every soul that reads it feels the search
    Of answering thought, and thousands there may be
    Saying at once, “How straight that looks at me!”
      Nor child nor fool it leaveth in the lurch;
    But, like the eyes that mark great Guido’s fame,
    It follows every one, as if by name.

  • The despot’s heel is on thy shore,
            Maryland!
    His torch is at thy temple door,
            Maryland!
    Avenge the patriotic gore
    That flecked the streets of Baltimore,
    And be the battle-queen of yore,
            Maryland, my Maryland!

    Hark to an exiled son’s appeal,
            Maryland!
    My Mother State, to thee I...

  • Just as the spring came laughing through the strife,
        With all its gorgeous cheer,
    In the bright April of historic life
        Fell the great cannoneer.

    The wondrous lulling of a hero’s breath
        His bleeding country weeps;
    Hushed, in the alabaster arms of Death,
        Our young Marcellus sleeps.

    Nobler and grander than the...

  • The saviour, bowed beneath his cross, climbed up the dreary hill,
    And from the agonizing wreath ran many a crimson rill;
    The cruel Roman thrust him on with un-relenting hand,
    Till, staggering slowly mid the crowd, He fell upon the sand.

    A little bird that warbled near, that memorable day,
    Flitted around and strove to wrench one single thorn away;...

  • Furl that Banner, for ’t is weary;
    Round its staff ’t is drooping dreary:
        Furl it, fold it,—it is best;
    For there ’s not a man to wave it,
    And there ’s not a sword to save it,
    And there ’s not one left to lave it
    In the blood which heroes gave it,
    And its foes now scorn and brave it:
        Furl it, hide it,—let it rest!

    ...