Wise men I hold those rakes of old
Who, as we read in antique story,
When lyres were struck and wine was poured,
Set the white Death's Head on the board--
Memento mori.

Love well! love truly! and love fast!
True love evades the dilatory.
Life's bloom flares like a meteor past;
A joy so dazzling cannot last--
Memento mori.

Stop not to pluck the leaves of bay
That greenly deck the path of glory,
The wreath will wither if you stay,
So pass along your earnest way--
Memento mori.

'Tis love that blinds my heart and eyes,--
I sometimes say in doubting dreams,--
The face that near me perfect seems
Cold Memory paints in fainter dyes.

'T was but love's dazzled eyes--I say--
That made her seem so strangely bright;
The face I worshipped yesternight,
I dread to meet it changed to-day.

As, when dies out some song's refrain,
And leaves your eyes in happy tears,
Awake the same fond idle fears,--
It cannot sound so sweet again.

You wait and say with vague annoy,
"It will not sound so sweet again,"

Sad is the thought of sunniest days
Of love and rapture perished,
And shine through memory's tearful haze
The eyes once fondliest cherished.
Reproachful is the ghost of toys
That charmed while life was wasted.
But saddest is the thought of joys
That never yet were tasted.

Sad is the vague and tender dream
Of dead love's lingering kisses,
To crushed hearts haloed by the gleam
Of unreturning blisses;
Deep mourns the soul in anguished pride
For the pitiless death that won them,--
But the saddest wail is for lips that died

Come home, my love, come home!
The twilight is falling,
The whippoorwill calling,
The night is very near,
And the darkness full of fear,
Come home to my arms, come home!

Come home, my love, come home!
In folly we parted,
And now, lonely hearted,
I know you look in vain
For a love like mine again;
Come home to my arms, come home!

Come home, dear love, come home!
I've much to forgive you,
And more yet to give you.
I'll put a little light
In the window every night,--
Come home to my arms, come home.

Each shining light above us
Has its own peculiar grace;
But every light of heaven
Is in my darling's face.

For it is like the sunlight,
So strong and pure and warm,
That folds all good and happy things,
And guards from gloom and harm.

And it is like the moonlight,
So holy and so calm;
The rapt peace of a summer night,
When soft winds die in balm.

And it is like the starlight;
For, love her as I may,
She dwells still lofty and serene
In mystery far away.

A sentinel angel sitting high in glory
Heard this shrill wail ring out from Purgatory:
"Have mercy, mighty angel, hear my story!

"I loved,--and, blind with passionate love, I fell.
Love brought me down to death, and death to Hell.
For God is just, and death for sin is well.

"I do not rage against his high decree,
Nor for myself do ask that grace shall be;
But for my love on earth who mourns for me.

"Great Spirit! Let me see my love again;
And comfort him one hour, and I were fain
To pay a thousand years of fire and pain."

I

WORK

Let me but do my work from day to day,
In field or forest, at the desk or loom,
In roaring market-place or tranquil room;
Let me but find it in my heart to say,
When vagrant wishes beckon me astray,
"This is my work; my blessing, not my doom;
Of all who live, I am the one by whom
This work can best be done in the right way."

Then shall I see it not too great, nor small,
To suit my spirit and to prove my powers;
Then shall I cheerful greet the labouring hours,

Don't you love the eyes that come from Ireland?
The grey-blue eyes so strangely grey and blue,
The fighting loving eyes,
The eyes that tell no lies--
Don't you love the eyes that come from Ireland?

Don't you love the eyes that come from Ireland?
The dreaming mocking eyes that see you through,
The eyes that smile and smile,
With the heart-break all the while,--
Don't you love the eyes that come from Ireland?

Don't you love the eyes that come from Ireland?
The eyes that hate of England made so blue,
The mystic eyes that see

You shall not dare to drink this cup,
Yet fear this other I hold up--
Sings Love in Spain:

One brimming deep with woman's breath--
This other moon-lit cup is Death;
Drink one, drink twain.

No sippers we of ladies' lips,
Toyers of amorous finger tips,
Are we in Spain.

Terrible like a bright sweet sword,
And little tender is the Lord
Of Love in Spain.

His song a tiger-throated thing,--
A crouch, a cry, a frightened string;
Death the refrain.

Scarlet and lightning are its words,
There is no room in it for birds

They sit within a woodland place,
Trellised with rustling light and shade;
So like a spirit is her face
That he is half afraid
To speak--lest she should fade.

Mysterious, beneath the boughs,
Like two enchanted shapes, they are,
Whom Love hath builded them a house
Of little leaf and star,
And the brown evening jar.

So lovely and so strange a thing
Each is to each to look upon,
They dare not hearken a bird sing,
Or from the other one
Take eyes--lest they be gone.

So still--the watching woodland peers