“ The love-line is the lane wherein we camp. The life-line is the road we wander on. Mount Venus, Jupiter, and all the rest Are finger-tips of ranges clasping round And holding up the Romany's wide sky."
Oh, gipsies, proud and stiff-necked and perverse, Saying: "We will swap horses till the doom, And mend the pots and kettles of mankind, And lend our sons to big-time vaudeville, Or to the race-track, or the learned world. But India's Brahma waits within their breasts. They will return to us with gipsy grins, And chatter Romany, and shake their curls And hug the dirtiest babies in the camp. ”

“ Two slim men of white bronze Beat each with a hammer on the end of a rod The hours of God. Striking a bell, They do it well. And the echoes jump, and tinkle, and swell In the Cathedral's carved stone polygons.
The swans float About the moat, And another swan sits still in the air Above the old inn. He gazes into the street And swims the cold and the heat, He has always been there, At least so say the cobbles in the square. They listen to the beat Of the hammered bell, And think of the feet Which beat upon their tops; But what they think they do not tell. ”

“ IV Here is a wound that never will heal, I know, Being wrought not of a dearness and a death But of a love turned ashes and the breath Gone out of beauty; never again will grow The grass on that scarred acre, though I sow Young seed there yearly and the sky bequeath Its friendly weathers down, far underneath Shall be such bitterness of an old woe.
That April should be shattered by a gust, That August should be leveled by a rain, I can endure, and that the lifted dust Of man should settle to the earth again; But that a dream can die, will be a thrust Between my ribs forever of hot pain. ”

“ Against the ice-white wall of light in the west Skeleton trees bow down in a stream of air. Leaves, black leaves and smoke, are blown on the wind; Mount upward past my window; swoop again; In a sharp silence, loudly, loudly falls The first cold drop, striking a shriveled leaf.... Doom and dusk for the earth! Upward I reach To draw chill curtains and shut out the dark, Pausing an instant, with uplifted hand, To watch, between black ruined portals of cloud, One star,—the tottering portals fall and crush it. ”

“ And that's a tune we all dance to. Little poet people snatching ivy, Trying to prevent one another from snatching ivy. If you get a leaf, there's another for me; Look at the bush. But I want your leaf, Brother, and you mine, Therefore, of course, we push.
"Here we go round the laurel-tree." Do we want laurels for ourselves most, Or most that no one else shall have any? We cannot stop to discuss the question. We cannot stop to plait them into crowns Or notice whether they become us. We scarcely see the laurel-tree, The crowd about us is all we see, And there's no room in it for you and me. ”

“ Laugh at the unshed leaf, say what you will, Call me in all things what I was before, A flutterer in the wind, a woman still; I tell you I am what I was and more.
My branches weigh me down, frost cleans the air, My sky is black with small birds bearing south; Say what you will, confuse me with fine care, Put by my word as but an April truth,— Autumn is no less on me that a rose Hugs the brown bough and sighs before it goes. ”

“ Witches! fairies! elves! who wait for the moon To thrust her golden horn, like a golden snail, Above that mountain—arch your green benediction Once more over my heart. Muffle the sound of bells, Mournfully human, that cries from the darkening valley; Close, with your leaves, about the sound of water: Take me among your hearts as you take the mist Among your boughs!" ... Now by the granite milestone, On the ancient human road that winds to nowhere, The pilgrim listens, as the night air brings The murmured echo, perpetual, from the gorge Of barren rock far down the valley. ”

“ All other farm machinery's gone in, And some of it on no more legs and wheel Than the grindstone can boast to stand or go. (I'm thinking chiefly of the wheelbarrow.) For months it hasn't known the taste of steel, Washed down with rusty water in a tin. But standing outdoors, hungry, in the cold, Except in towns, at night, is not a sin. And, anyway, its standing in the yard Under a ruinous live apple tree Has nothing any more to do with me, Except that I remember how of old, One summer day, all day I drove it hard, And some one mounted on it rode it hard, And he and I between us ground a blade. ”

“ Look! this flesh how it crumbles to dust and is blown! These bones, how they grind in the granite of frost and are nothing! This skull, how it yawns for a flicker of time in the darkness Yet laughs not and sees not! It is crushed by a hammer of sunlight, And the hands are destroyed.... Press down through the leaves of the jasmine, Dig through the interlaced roots—nevermore will you find me; I was no better than dust, yet you cannot replace me.... Take the soft dust in your hand—does it stir: does it sing? Has it lips and a heart? Does it open its eyes to the sun? ”

“ May is lilac here in New England, May is a thrush singing "Sun up!" on a tip-top ash-tree, May is white clouds behind pine-trees Puffed out and marching upon a blue sky. May is a green as no other, May is much sun through small leaves, May is soft earth, And apple-blossoms, And windows open to a South wind. ”

“ Houses were built above me; trees let fall Yellowing leaves upon me, hands of ghosts, Rain has showered its arrows of silver upon me Seeking my heart; winds have roared and tossed me; Music in long blue waves of sound has borne me A helpless weed to shores of unthought silence; Time, above me, within me, crashed its gongs Of terrible warning, sifting the dust of death; And here I lie. Blow now your horns of glory Harshly over my flesh, you trees, you waters! ”

“ You are brighter than apples, Sweeter than tulips, You are the great flood of our souls Bursting above the leaf-shapes of our hearts, You are the smell of all Summers, The love of wives and children, The recollection of the gardens of little children, You are State Houses and Charters And the familiar treading of the foot to and fro on a road it knows. ”

“ The world is old and our century Must be well along, and we've no time to waste. Make haste, Brothers and Sisters, push With might and main round the ivy-bush, Struggle and pull at the laurel-tree, And leave the barberries be For poor lost lunatics like me, Who set them so high They overtop the sun in the sky. Does it matter at all that we don't know why? ”

“ Across the country, between two ocean shore lines, where cities cling to rail and water routes, there people and horses stop in their foot tracks, cars and wagons stop in their wheel tracks— faces at street crossings shine with a silence of eggs laid in a row on a pantry shelf— among the ways and paths of the flow of the Republic faces come to a standstill, sixty clockticks count— in the name of the Boy, in the name of the Republic. ”

“ AMY LOWELL LILACS Lilacs, False blue, White, Purple, Color of lilac, Your great puffs of flowers Are everywhere in this my New England. Among your heart-shaped leaves Orange orioles hop like music-box birds and sing Their little weak soft songs; In the crooks of your branches The bright eyes of song sparrows sitting on spotted eggs Peer restlessly through the light and shadow Of all Springs. Lilacs in dooryards Holding quiet conversations with an early moon; Lilacs watching a deserted house Settling sideways into the grass of an old road ”

“ O love, as summer goes, I must be gone, steal forth with silent drums, That you may hail anew the bird and rose When I come back to you, as summer comes. Else will you seek, at some not distant time, Even your summer in another clime. ”

“ If he be hungry, one huge fin Drives seven thousand fishes in; And when he drinks what he may need, The rivers of the earth recede. Yet he is more than huge and strong— Twelve brilliant colors play along His sides until, compared to him, The naked, burning sun seems dim. New scintillating rays extend Through endless singing space and rise Into an ecstasy that cries: "Ascend, Leviathan, ascend!" ”

“ An old roof crashing on a Bishop's tomb, Swarms of men with a thirst for room, And the footsteps blur to a shower, shower, shower, Of men passing—passing—every hour, With arms of power, and legs of power, And power in their strong, hard minds. No need then For the slim bronze men Who beat God's hours: Prime, Tierce, None. [Pg 15] Who wants to hear? No one. We will melt them, and mold them, And make them a stem For a banner gorged with blood, For a blue-mouthed torch. So the men rush like clouds, They strike their iron edges on the Bishop's chair And fling down the lanterns by the tower stair. ”

“ V In the ghostly dawn I write new words for your ears— Even now you sleep. [Pg 9]
VI This then is morning. Have you no comfort for me Cold-colored flowers?
VII My eyes are weary Following you everywhere. Short, oh short, the days!
VIII When the flower falls The leaf is no more cherished. Every day I fear.
IX Even when you smile Sorrow is behind your eyes. Pity me, therefore.
X Laugh—it is nothing. To others you may seem gay, I watch with grieved eyes. [Pg 10]
XI Take it, this white rose. Stems of roses do not bleed; Your fingers are safe. ”

“ Stars of the night sky, did you see that phantom fadeout, did you see those phantom riders, [Pg 48] skeleton riders on skeleton horses, stems of roses in their teeth, rose leaves red on white-jaw slants, grinning along on Pennsylvania Avenue, the top-sergeants calling roll calls— did their horses nicker a horse laugh? did the ghosts of the boney battalions move out and on, up the Potomac, over on the Ohio and out to the Mississippi, the Missouri, the Red River, and down to the Rio Grande, and on to the Yazoo, over to the Chattahoochee and up to the Rappahannock? ”

“ They will dance near such temples as best suit them, Though they will not quite enter, or adore, Looking on roofs, as poets look on lilies, Looking at towers, as boys at forest vines, That leap to tree-tops through the dizzy air. I know all this, when gipsy fiddles cry.
And with the gipsies there will be a king And a thousand desperadoes just his style, With all their rags dyed in the blood of roses, Splashed with the blood of angels, and of demons. And he will boss them with an awful voice. ”

“ God now commands the multi-colored bands Of angels to intrude and slay the beast That His good sons may have a feast of food. But as they come, Leviathan sneezes twice ... And, numb with sudden pangs, each arm hangs slack. Black terror seizes them; blood freezes into ice And every angel flees from the attack! God, with a look that spells eternal law, Compels them back. But, though they fight and smite him tail and jaw, [Pg 119] Nothing avails; upon his scales their swords Break like frayed cords or, like a blade of straw, Bend towards the hilt and wilt like faded grass. ”

“ In the dusk-sharpened sky A pair of night-hawks windily sweep, or fall, Booming, toward the trees. Thus had it been Last year, and the year before, and many years: Ever the same. "Thus turns the human track Backward upon itself, I stand once more By this small stream..." Now the rich sound of leaves, Turning in air to sway their heavy boughs, Burns in his heart, sings in his veins, as spring Flowers in veins of trees; bringing such peace [Pg 172] As comes to seamen when they dream of seas. "O trees! exquisite dancers in gray twilight! ”

“ And having determined whom and having learned how, when you bring these together, inform the far of the intimate— like a bubble on a pond, emerging from below, round wonderment completed by the first sight of the sky— what good will it do, if she shouldn't, I love you?— a bubble's but a bubble once, a bubble grows to die. ”

“ We eat the grain, the grain is death, all goes back to the earth's dark mass, All but a song which moves across the plain like the wind's deep-muttering breath. Bowed down upon the earth, man sets his plants and watches for the seed, Though he be part of the tragic pageant of the sky, no heaven will aid his mortal need. ”

“ A blast of Gabriel's horn has torn away The last haze from our eyes, and we can see Past the three hundred skies and gaze upon The Ineffable Name engraved deep in the sun. Now one by one, the pious and the just Are seated by us, radiantly risen From their dull prison in the dust. And then the festival begins! A sudden music spins great webs of sound Spanning the ground, the stars and their companions ”

“ With hoists and levers, joists and poles, With knives and cleavers, ropes and saws, Down the long slopes to the gaping maws, The angels hasten; hacking and carving, So nought will be lacking for the starving Chosen of God, who in frozen wonderment Realize now what the terrible thunder meant. How their mouths water while they are looking At miles of slaughter and sniffing the cooking! ”

“ And the dew on the grass and his own cold tears Were one in brooding mystery, Though death's loud thunder came upon him, Though death's loud thunder struck him down— The boughs and the proud thoughts swept through the thunder, Till he saw our wide nation, each State a flower, Each petal a park for holy feet, [Pg 65] With wild fawns merry on every street, With wild fawns merry on every street, The vista of ten thousand years, flower-lighted and complete. ”

“ Night comes on, and even the night is wounded; There, on its breast, it carries a curved, white scar. What will you find out there that is not torn and anguished? Can God be less distressed than the least of His creatures are? ”

“ But I shall stay Here, where the ancient milestone, like a watchman, Lifts up its figure eight, its one gray knowledge, Into the twilight; as a watchman lifts A lantern, which he does not know is out." [Pg 173]
II Now by the wall of the ancient town I lean Myself, like ancient wall and dust and sky, And the purple dusk, grown old, grown old in heart. Shadows of clouds flow inward from the sea. The mottled fields grow dark. The golden wall Grows gray again, turns stone again, the tower, No longer kindled, darkens against a cloud. Old is the world, old as the world am I ”