'Tis sweet to sit beneath these walnut trees,
And pore upon the sun in splendour sinking,
And think upon the wond'rous mysteries
Of this so lovely world, until, with thinking,
Thought is bewilder'd, and the spirit, shrinking
Into itself, no outward object sees,
Still, from its inward fount, new visions drinking,
Till the sense swims in dreamy reveries

Awaking from this trance, with gentle start,
'Tis sweeter still to feel th' o'erflowing heart
Shoot its glad gushes to the thrilling cheek;
To feel as if the yearning soul would dart

Lone warbler! thy love-melting heart supplies
The liquid music-fall, that from thy bill
Gushes in such ecstatic rhapsodies,
Drowning night's ear. Yet thine is but the skill
Of loftier love, that hung up in the skies
Those everlasting lamps, man's guide, until
Morning return, and bade fresh flowers arise,
Blooming by night, new fragrance to distil

Why are these blessings lavish'd from above
On man, when his unconscious sense and sight
Are closed in sleep; but that the few who rove,
From want or woe, or travels urge by night,

In my devout Muse could ever bring
Ought worth acceptance, or an offering
Unto thy Vertue, justly I might deeme
My selfe thrice happie in so good a theme.
Yet let thy worth vouchsafe to take these lines,
As the pledges of my great Love, and signes
Of true affection, wanting alone
Art to discover that impression,
Which the conceit of thy most high desert
Hath Charracterd so deepely in my heart.
And though my penne a pencill be scarce fit
To Paint out to the life thy merrit; yet
My heart shall ever be engag'd to thee;

My heaven is full of words but I desire love,
My heaven is crowded to the doors with good people but I hunger for sinners,
My heaven is dazed with suns—everywhere suns—but I crave for the shadows,
My heaven is the confirmation of the prophets but I am wayward and the prophets bore me,
My heaven is the home of the saints but I shrink from the saints and disdain their prerogatives.
I had done all I could to enrich life and point it the way of my heaven:
Finally I arrived—the last doubting step was taken

Let Burns and old Chaucer unite
The praise of the Daisy to sing,—
Let Wordsworth of Celandine write,
And crown her the Queen of the Spring;
The Hyacinth's classical fame
Let Milton embalm in his verse;
Be mine the glad task to proclaim
The Charms of untrumpeted Furze!

Of all other bloom when bereft,
And Sol wears his wintery screen,
Thy sunshining blossoms are left
To light up the common and green
O why should they envy the peer
His perfume of spices and myrrhs,
When the poorest their senses may cheer

From the prisons dark of the circling bark
The leaves of tenderest green are glancing;
They gambol on high in the bright blue sky,
Fondly with spring's young Zephyrs dancing,
While music and joy and jubilee gush
From the lark and linnet, the blackbird and thrush.

The butterfly springs on its new-born wings,
The dormouse starts from his wintry sleeping;
The flowers of earth find a second birth,
To light and life from the darkness leaping:
The roses and tulips will soon resume
Their youth's first perfume and primitive bloom.

The crowder's tune
Down a street in Babylon—
His fiddle to the moon
With notes like stars that one by one
Glittered upon the empty street,
Glittered and laughed and went
(But there was a lisp of ghostly feet)
To build a firmament.

“Who walks by night in Babylon?
‘I,’ said a lady, ‘because
Of the wonderful thing I was,
And the beautiful things all done,
I walk in Babylon.’

Who seeks for a lady by night?
‘I,’ said a king, ‘My throne
Is empty in Babylon.
She fled from the light to the light,
I seek for a lady by night.’

Just a door between us,—no more,
And your hand on the bell,
When a voice inside of the door
Broke the spell.

And you turned, perhaps with a sigh,
From the small garden gate,
And I never knew you were by
Till too late.

So near, so near, yet so far!
Just a thin narrow door
Shut between us,—just a far
Evermore!

And now, perhaps with a sigh,
Or a smile,—who can tell?—
I think what we missed, you and I,
For that bell.

God knew best, though when your last letter
Told the story to me,
For a time, I thought I knew better,

Our bark is on the waters! wide around,
The wandering wave; above, the lonely sky.
Hush! a young sea-bird floats, and that quick cry
Shrieks to the levelled weapon's echoing sound,
Grasps its lank wing, and on, with reckless bound!
Yet, creature of the surf, a sheltering breast
To-night shall haunt in vain thy far-off nest,
A call unanswered, search the rocky ground.
Lord of Leviathan! when Ocean heard,
Thy gathering voice, and sought his native breeze;
When whales first plunged with life, and the proud deep
Felt unborn tempests heave in troubled sleep;

Give me the wings, magician. I will know
What blooms on airy precipices grow
That no hand plucks, large unexpected blossoms,
Scentless, with cry of curlews in their bosoms,
And the great winds like grasses where their stems
Spangle the universe with diadems.
I will pluck those flowers and those grasses, I,
Icarus, drowning upwards through the sky
With air that closes underneath my feet
As water above the diver. I will meet
Life with the dawn in heaven, and my fingers
Dipped in the golden floss of hair that lingers