And the Dervish spat
in his cloak and said:
When at last
we screwed the coffin lid down on him,
he was saying, GOD IS MY LORD ,
DEATHLESS, ETERNAL .
He loved God and stood in fear of Him,
he held Him in reverence
in himself and in others.
But, Sire, should you happen to catch
a glimpse of God
it would make the mountains
and the sea get up and follow you.

And so you found that poor room dull,
Dark, hardly to your taste, my dear?
Its features seemed unbeautiful:
But this I know--'twas there, not here,
You plighted troth to me, the word
Which--ask that poor room how it heard!

And this rich room obtains your praise
Unqualified,--so bright, so fair,
So all whereat perfection stays?
Ay, but remember--here, not there,
The other word was spoken!--Ask
This rich room how you dropped the mask!

Concerning the Late Lamented King of the Cannibal Islands
And so our royal relative is dead!
And so he rests from gustatory labors!
The white man was his choice, but when he fed
He'd sometimes entertain his tawny neighbors.
He worshipped, as he said, his " Fe-fo-fum, "
The goddess of the epigastrium.

And missionaries graced his festive board,
Solemn and succulent, in twos and dozens,
And smoked before their hospitable lord,
Welcome as if they'd been his second cousins.
When cold, he warmed them as he would his kin —

She lost her daughter Jiva, which means " Alive. " The Buddha, seeing her weeping near the charnel-field, said to her, " Burnt in this cemetery are some 84,000 of thy daughters. For which of them dost thou weep? " He is the speaker of the first half of the psalm.
O Ubbiri, who wailest in the wood,
Crying, " O Jiva! O my daughter dear! "
Come to thyself! Lo in this burying-ground
Are burnt full many a thousand daughters dear,
And all of them were named like unto her.
Now which of all those Jivas dost thou mourn?

And " Science" said,
" Attention, Child, to me!
Have I not taught you all
You touch; taste; hear; and see?

" Nought that's true knowledge now
In print is pent
Which my sole method
Did not circumvent.

" Think you, the amoeba
In its primal slime
Wasted on dreams
Its destiny sublime?

" Yet, when I bid
Your eyes survey the board
Whereon life's How, When, Where
I now record,

" I find them fixed
In daydream; and you sigh;
Or, like a silly sheep,
You bleat me, Why ?

And oh, to think the sun can shine,
The birds can sing, the flowers can bloom,
And she, whose soul was all divine,
Be darkly mouldering in the tomb:

That o'er her head the night-wind sighs,
And the sad cypress droops and moans;
That night has veiled her glorious eyes,
And silence hushed her heavenly tones:

That those sweet lips no more can smile,
Nor pity's tender shadows chase,
With many a gentle, child-like wile,
The rippling laughter o'er her face:

That dust is on the burnished gold

And O and O,
The daisies blow,
And the primroses are wakened;
And the violets white
Sit in silver light,
And in the green buds are long in the spike end.

And now the trembling light
Glimmers behind the little hills and corn,
Lingering as loath to part. Yet part thou must,
And though than open day far pleasing more
(Ere yet the fields, and pearléd cups of flowers
Twinkle in the parting light),
Thee night shall hide, sweet visionary gleam
That softly lookest through the rising dew—
Till, all like silver bright,
The Faithful Witness, pure and white,
Shall look o'er yonder grassy hill
At this village, safe, and still.
All is safe, and all is still,

I

Drowning
I felt for a moment reaching towards me
finger tips against mine.

II

You mice,
that ate the crumbs of my freedom,
lo!

III

The clock strikes:
these are the steps of our departure.

IV

A brown oak leaf
scraping the sidewalk
frightened me.

V

Proserpine
swallowed only six seeds
of the pomegranate
and had to stay six months among the dead —
I was a glutton.

Though our thoughts often, we ourselves
are seldom together.
We have told each other
all that has happened; it seems to me —
for want of a better word — that we are both unlucky.
Even our meetings have been so brief
we should call them partings, and of our words
I remember most " good-by " .