Summer wanes—I saw a swallow flying
Southward in the search of love and light.
Sweetheart, hearken how the wind is sighing,
Ever after blossom cometh blight.

Summer wanes—I found a lily lying
Withered by the frost of yesternight.
Sweetheart mine, the roses are a-dying,
Ever after blossom cometh blight.

Summer wanes—my lips are weary crying,
“Love me a little when the sun is bright.”
Even as I plead the echoes are replying,
“Ever after blossom cometh blight.”

Summer wanes—no longer, fate defying,

Shall I set any blessing this side heaven
Against thy love for me—the light that shows
All other joy, the light whereby it grows?
Yes, one boon richer than thy love is given—
The right to love thee! If thy strength of wing
Can bear me with thee to thy luminous sphere
Of duty, take me; but I would not cling
With an encumbering clasp to keep thee here.
'Tis dear to think thee of myself a part;
More dear, though lost, to know thee what thou art:
And if, being such, thou vanish from my eyes,
I, nursing thoughts of thee, will wait the day

Wounded with grief, I weep, and sigh, and plain;
Yet neither plaints, nor sighs, nor tears do good,
But all in vain I strive against the flood,
Gaining but grief for grief, and pain for pain.
Yet though in vain my tears my cheeks distain,
Leaving engraven sorrow where they stood;
And though my sighs consuming up my blood,
For love deserved, reap undeserved disdain;
And though in vain I know I beg remorse
At your remorseless heart, more hard than steel;
Yet such, alas, such is your beauty's force,
Charming my sense, that though this hell I feel,

Nor force nor fraud shall sunder us! Oh ye
Who north or south, on east or western land,
Native to noble sounds, say truth for truth,
Freedom for freedom, love for love, and God
For God; Oh ye who in eternal youth
Speak with a living and creative flood
This universal English, and do stand
Its breathing book; live worthy of that grand
Heroic utterance—parted, yet a whole,
Far, yet unsevered,—children brave and free
Of the great Mother-tongue, and ye shall be
Lords of an Empire wide as Shakespeare's soul,
Sublime as Milton's immemorial theme,

What right have I to hold back Love so late,
When we should long have gone to rest?
But we were pelted by the storms of Fate
From where we rashly built our nest.
One there is yet who drives us not away,
But warms our hands in her's this winter day.

[HE] I have a song to sing, O!
[SHE] Sing me your song, O!
[HE] It is sung to the moon
By a love-lorn loon,
Who fled from the mocking throng, O!
It's the song of a merryman, moping mum,
Whose soul was sad, whose glance was glum,
Who sipped no sup, and who craved no crumb,
As he sighed for the love of a ladye.
Heighdy! heighdy!
Misery me—lackadaydee!
He sipped no sup, and he craved no crumb,
As he sighed for the love of a ladye!

[SHE] I have a song to sing, O!
[HE] Sing me your song, O!
[SHE] It is sung with the ring
Of the song maids sing

I THOUGHT our love at full, but I did err;
Joy's wreath drooped o'er mine eyes; I could not see
That sorrow in our happy world must be
Love's deepest spokesman and interpreter:
But, as a mother feels her child first stir
Under her heart, so felt I instantly
Deep in my soul another bond to thee
Thrill with that life we saw depart from her;
O mother of our angel child! twice dear!
Death knits as well as parts, and still, I wis,
Her tender radiance shall infold us here,
Even as the light, borne up by inward bliss,

“Come where my love lies dreaming,”
That song our parents enjoyed.
But now, her bright eyes beaming,
My love reads Old Doc Freud.


Last night as I lay on my pillow,
Last night as I lay in my bed—
Last night as I lay on my pillow,
I dreamed of Alonzo and Fred.


I dreamt that I dwelt in marble halls,
With Herbert and Al by my side;
I dreamed I was passing Niagara Falls
And I was a joyous young bride.
I dreamed of a tree and a ship and a fire,
And a garden with ten high walls;
And it means that for years I've suppressed a desire

Their names are unknown, but these herbs—
All of them have lovely flowers.

Love is honest farming.
It is planting in the deepest place,
and only on the very last day