I'd find out music in the hail
And all the winds that blow.

If I might see another Spring —
O stinging comment on my past
That all my past results in “if”.

If I might see another Spring
I'd laugh to-day, to-day is brief;
I would not wait for anything:
I'd use to-day that cannot last,
Be glad to-day and sing.

S

A PEAL OF BELLS.

TRIKE the bells wantonly,
Tinkle tinkle well;

Bring me wine, bring me flowers,
Ring the silver bell.

All my lamps burn scented oil,
Hung on laden orange-trees,
Whose shadowed foliage is the foil
To golden lamps and oranges.
Heap my golden plates with fruit,

Golden fruit, fresh-plucked and ripe; Strike the bells and breathe the pipe ; Shut out showers from summer hours; Silence that complaining lute;

Shut out thinking, shut out pain,

From hours that cannot come again.

Strike the bells solemnly,

Ding dong deep:

My friend is passing to his bed,

Fast asleep;

There's plaited linen round his head,
While foremost go his feet,
His feet that cannot carry him.

My feast's a show, my lights are dim ;
Be still, your music is not sweet, -
There is no music more for him:

His lights are out, his feast is done;
His bowl that sparkled to the brim
Is drained, is broken, cannot hold;
My blood is chill, his blood is cold;
His death is full, and mine begun.

A

FATA MORGANA.

BLUE-EYED phantom far before

Is laughing, leaping toward the sun :

Like lead I chase it evermore,

I pant and run.

It breaks the sunlight bound on bound;
Goes singing as it leaps along

To sheep-bells with a dreamy sound

A dreamy song.

I laugh, it is so brisk and gay;
It is so far before, I weep:
I hope I shall lie down some day,
Lie down and sleep.

"NO, THANK YOU, JOHN."

I

NEVER said I loved you, John:

Why will you tease me, day by day,
And wax a weariness to think upon
With always "do" and "pray"?

You know I never loved you, John;

No fault of mine made me your toast: Why will you haunt me with a face as wan As shows an hour-old ghost?

I dare say Meg or Moll would take
Pity upon you, if you 'd ask :

And pray don't remain single for my sake
Who can't perform that task.

I have no heart? - Perhaps I have not;
But then you're mad to take offence
That I don't give you what I have not got:
Use your own common sense.

Let bygones be bygones:

Don't call me false, who owed not to be true:

I'd rather answer

Than answer

"No" to fifty Johns

"Yes" to you.

Let's mar our pleasant days no more,
Song-birds of passage, days of youth:
Catch at to-day, forget the days before :
I'll wink at your untruth.

Let us strike hands as hearty friends;
No more, no less; and friendship's good :
Only don't keep in view ulterior ends,

And points not understood

In open treaty. Rise above

Quibbles and shuffling off and on : Here's friendship for you if you like; but love,No, thank you, John.

I

MAY.

CANNOT tell you how it was ;

But this I know: it came to pass

Upon a bright and breezy day

When May was young; ah, pleasant May!

As yet the poppies were not born

Between the blades of tender corn;

The last eggs had not hatched as yet,

Nor any bird foregone its mate.

I cannot tell you what it was;
But this I know it did but pass.
It passed away with sunny May,
With all sweet things it passed away,
And left me old, and cold, and gray.

I

A PAUSE OF THOUGHT.

LOOKED for that which is not, nor can be,

And hope deferred made my heart sick in truth But years must pass before a hope of youth Is resigned utterly.

I watched and waited with a steadfast will:
And though the object seemed to flee away
That I so longed for, ever day by day
I watched and waited still.

Sometimes I said: This thing shall be no more ;
My expectation wearies and shall cease;
I will resign it now and be at peace :
Yet never gave it o'er.

Sometimes I said: It is an empty name

I long for; to a name why should I give
The peace of all the days I have to live?
Yet gave it all the same.