Willows weave spring sorrow,
brow knit in sorrow, I lean from painted tower.
Red sorrow, green sadness—on each branch wither flowers;
the old sorrow not yet gone,
new sorrow comes as well.
How many sunsets have I passsed in sorrow?
The hook of sorrow hangs above:
let me ask the moon about this sorrow.
In sorrow I watch the southern clouds withdraw.

Whoever weeps somewhere out in the world
Weeps without cause in the world
Weeps over me.

Whoever laughs somewhere out in the night
Laughs without cause in the night
Laughs at me.

Whoever wanders somewhere in the world
Wanders in vain in the world
Wanders to me.

Whoever dies somewhere in the world
Dies without cause in the world

Who reach their threescore years and ten,
—As I have mine, without a sigh,
Are either more or less than men—
———Not such am I.

I am not of them; life to me
—Has been a strange, bewildering dream,
Wherein I knew not things that be
———From things that seem.

I thought, I hoped, I knew one thing,
—And had one gift, when I was young—
The impulse and the power to sing,
———And so I sung.

To have a place in the high choir
—Of poets, and deserve the same—
What more could mortal man desire
———Than poet's fame?

Who kill'd John Keats?
‘I,’ says the Quarterly,
So savage and Tartarly;
‘'Twas one of my feats.’

Who shot the arrow?
‘The poet-priest Milman
(So ready to kill man),
Or Southey, or Barrow.’

Who builds of stone a shrine to bear his name,
Shall be forgot when months and years have flown;
Who writes his name upon the scroll of fame,
The centuries shall find to men unknown;
But who for fellow men endured the shame
Shall have eternal glory for his own.

Who builds of stone a shrine to bear his name,
—Shall be forgot when months and years have flown;
Who writes his name upon the scroll of fame,
—The centuries shall find to men unknown;
But who for fellow men endured the shame
—Shall have eternal glory for his own.

While yet the grapes were green, thou didst refuse me,
When they were ripe, didst proudly pass me by;
But do not grudge me still a single cluster,
Now that the grapes are withering and dry.

Where hast thou floated? in what seas pursued
Thy pastime? When wast thou an egg new spawned,
Lost in the immensity of ocean's waste?
Roar as they might, the overbearing winds
That rocked the deep, thy cradle, thou wast safe--
And in thy minnikin and embryo state,
Attached to the firm leaf of some salt weed,
Didst outlive tempests, such as wrung and racked
The joints of many a stout and gallant bark,
And whelmed them in the unexplored abyss.
Indebted to no magnet and no chart,
Nor under guidance of the polar fire,
Thou wast a voyager on many coasts,

When you go out at early morn,
Your busy hands, sweet drudge, are bare;
For you must work, and none are there
To see with scorn—to feel with scorn.

And when the weekly wars begin,
Your arms are naked to the hilt,
And many a sturdy pail's a-tilt
To sheathe them in—to plunge them in.

For you at least can understand
That daily work is hard and stern,
That those who toil for bread must learn
To bare the hand—to spoil the hand.

But in the evening, when they dine,
And you behind each frequent chair
Are flitting lightly here and there

O THE night was dark and the night was late,
And the robbers came to rob him;
And they picked the locks of his palace-gate,
The robbers that came to rob him—
They picked the locks of his palace-gate,
Seized his jewels and gems of state,
His coffers of gold and his priceless plate,—
The robbers that came to rob him.

But loud he laughed he in the morning red!—
For of what had the robbers robbed him?—
Ho! hidden safe, as he slept in bed,
When the robbers came to rob him,—
They robbed him not of a golden shred

When Delia on the plain appears,
Awed by a thousand tender fears
I would approach, but dare not move:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

Whene'er she speaks, my ravished ear
No other voice than hers can hear,
No other wit but hers approve:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

If she some other youth commend,
Though I was once his fondest friend,
His instant enemy I prove:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

When she is absent, I no more
Delight in all that pleased before—
The clearest spring, or shadiest grove: