ADIEU, O soldier!
You of the rude campaigning, (which we shared,)
The rapid march, the life of the camp,
The hot contention of opposing fronts—the long manoeuver,
To lose one's faith -- surpass
The loss of an Estate --
Because Estates can be
Replenished -- faith cannot --
THE long small room that showed willows in the west
Narrowed up to the end the fireplace filled,
Although not wide. I liked it. No one guessed
What need or accident made them so build.
THE new moon hangs like an ivory bugle
In the naked frosty blue;
And the ghylls of the forest, already blackened
By Winter, are blackened anew.
It was biting cold, and the falling snow,
Which filled a poor little match girl's heart with woe,
Who was bareheaded and barefooted, as she went along the street,
Crying, "Who'll buy my matches? for I want pennies to buy some meat!"
When Dryden's fool, "unknowing what he sought,"
His hours in whistling spent, "for want of thought,"
This guiltless oaf his vacancy of sense
Supplied, and amply too, by innocence:
With the same heart, I said, I'll answer thee
As those, when thou shalt call me by my name—
Lo, the vain promise! is the same, the same,
Perplexed and ruffled by life's strategy?
Farewell, ye coral caves, ye pearly sands,
Ye waving woods that crown yon lofty steep;
Farewell, ye Nereides of the glitt'ring deep,
Ye mountain tribes, ye fawns, ye sylvan bands:
I GAED a waefu’ gate yestreen,
A gate, I fear, I’ll dearly rue;
I gat my death frae twa sweet een,
Twa lovely een o’bonie blue.
FROM THE GREEK.
A man who was about to hang himself,
Finding a purse, then threw away his rope;
The owner, coming to reclaim his pelf,
Cloud-puffball, torn tufts, tossed pillows ' flaunt forth, then chevy on an air-
built thoroughfare: heaven-roysterers, in gay-gangs ' they throng; they glitter in marches.
Down roughcast, down dazzling whitewash, ' wherever an elm arches,
Shivelights and shadowtackle in long ' lashes lace, lance, and pair.
Struggling, and faint, and fainter didst thou wane,
O Moon! and round thee all thy starry train
Came forth to help thee, with half-open eyes,
And trembled every one with still surprise,
As Rochefoucauld his maxims drew
From nature, I believe 'em true:
They argue no corrupted mind
In him; the fault is in mankind.
Whoever comes to shroud me, do not harm
Nor question much
That subtle wreath of hair which crowns my arm;
The mystery, the sign, you must not touch,
The wind waves oer the meadows green
And shakes my own wild flowers
And shifts about the moving scene
Like the life of summer hours;
In this belovéd marble view
Above the works and thoughts of Man,
What Nature _could_ but _would not_ do,
And Beauty and Canova _can!_
WHEN we two walked in Lent
We imagined that happiness
Was something different
And this was something less.
LADY, accept the box a hero wore,
In spite of all this elegiac stuff:
Let not seven stanzas written by a bore,
Prevent your Ladyship from taking snuff!
When once the sun sinks in the west,
And dew-drops pearl the evening's breast;
Almost as pale as moonbeams are,
Or its companionable star,
Where the quiet-coloured end of evening smiles
Miles and miles
On the solitary pastures where our sheep
Half-asleep