She poured out nothing, very fast, the tea-pot tipped on high, And in the bowl found sugar lumps unseen by my dull eye. She added rich (pretended) cream seemed a wilful waste, - it Allowing only needful time to pour them, in between. We stirred with massive pewter spoons, and sipped in courtly ease, With all the ceremony of the stately Japan ese. At length she put the cups away. "Goodnight, Papa," she said; And I went to a real tea, and Dorothy to bed. THE SPIRIT OF THE MAINE IN battle-line of sombre gray As when beside Regillus Lake The Great Twin Brethren came A righteous fight for Rome to make Against the Deed of ShameSo now a ghostly ship shall doom The fleet of treacherous Spain : Before her guilty soul doth loom The spirit of the Maine! A wraith arrayed in peaceful white, Above the traitorous mine that night She glides before the avenging fleet, A sign of woe to Spain. Brave though her sons, how shall they meet The spirit of the Maine ! CANDLEMAS O HEARKEN, all ye little weeds That lie beneath the snow, Alice Brown (So low, dear hearts, in poverty so low!) O furry living things, adream On Winter's drowsy breast, (How rest ye there, how softly, safely rest !) Arise and follow where a gleam My birds, come back! the hollow sky Is weary for your note. (Sweet-throat, come back! O liquid, mellow throat!) Ere May's soft minions hereward fly, also, Telling in silence these sad beads of days? So let it be: though no sweet numbers flow, My breath shall be Thy praise. Yea, though Thou slay the life wherein men see The upward-mounting flame, the failing spark, My heart of love, that heart Thou gavest me, Shall beat on in the dark. LIFE WHAT, comrade of a night, Yet think not Thou I yield, When all the young year's way Grows sweeter day by day; When almond buds unclose, Who doubts of May's red rose? YOSEMITE FROM THE WASHINGTON SEQUOIA " SOUL of a tree ungrown, new life out of God's life proceeding, Folded close in the seed, waking-O wonder of wonders Waking with power as a spirit to clothe thee in leaves and in branches, What, in thine age-long future, is the word thou art set here to say? Far in the great Sierra dwell the mighty groups of thy kindred; Aisles of the sounding pines; and colonnades dusky and fragrant, Pillared with ridgy shafts of tall and wonderful cedar, Lead to their presence; and round them forever the mountains stand. Deep in that inner temple listens the fortunate pilgrim, Low where the red lilies tremble he lies while the still hours pass by him, Baring his brows to the silence, the dear and intimate greatness, The touch of the friendly air, like a quiet and infinite hand. Far, far up from the earth, in the lower spaces of heaven, Shadowy green on the blue, rests the moving lace of the branches, Holding the faint winds captive, dropping but lightest of murmurs, Spirits of far-away sound, to the windless reaches below. Deep in that inner temple listens the fortunate pilgrim; Infinite things they say to him, the mighty groups of thy kindred, Life beyond life, and soul within soul, and God around all as an ocean, Whispers his heart dimly guesses, secrets he never may know. |