"To-morrow," said they, strong with hope, I shivered comfortless, but cast To stay, and yet to part how loth: FROM SUNSET TO STAR RISE. O from me, summer friends, and tarry not: I am no summer friend, but wintry cold, A silly sheep benighted from the fold, A sluggard with a thorn-choked garden plot. Dwell in your pleasant places, hoard your gold; Athirst and hungering on a barren spot. For I have hedged me with a thorny hedge, I live alone, I look to die alone: Yet sometimes when a wind sighs through the sedge, My heart goes sighing after swallows flown I LOVE FROM THE NORTH. HAD a love in soft south land, He waited on my lightest breath, He saddened if my cheer was sad, But We never differed on a hair, My yes his yes, my nay his nay. The wedding hour was come, the aisles Were flushed with sun and flowers that day; I pacing balanced in my thoughts, - My bridegroom answered in his turn, Myself had almost answered "yea": Bridemaids and bridegroom shrank in fear, But I stood high who stood at bay: "And if I answer yea, fair Sir, What man art thou to bar with nay?" He was a strong man from the north, Light-locked, with eyes of dangerous gray: "Put yea by for another time In which I will not say thee nay." He took me in his strong white arms, He made me fast with book and bell, Till now I've neither heart nor power E WINTER RAIN. VERY valley drinks, Every dell and hollow : Where the kind rain sinks and sinks, Green of Spring will follow. Yet a lapse of weeks Buds will burst their edges, Strip their wool-coats, glue-coats, streaks, In the woods and hedges; Weave a bower of love For birds to meet each other, Weave a canopy above Nest and egg and mother. But for fattening rain We should have no flowers, Never a mated bird In the rocking tree-tops, Never indeed a flock or herd To graze upon the lea-crops. Lambs so woolly white, Sheep the sun-bright leas on, They could have no grass to bite But for rain in season. We should find no moss But miles of barren sand, With never a son or daughter, Or lily on the water. WHY A DIRGE. HY were you born when the snow was falling? Or when grapes are green in the cluster, Or, at least, when lithe swallows muster For their far off flying From summer dying. Why did you die when the lambs were cropping? And all winds go sighing For sweet things dying. |