STRANGER! the MAN OF NATURE lies not here:
Enshrin'd far distant by his rival's side
His relics rest, there by the giddy throng
With blind idolatry alike revered!
Wiselier directed have thy pilgrim feet
Explor'd the scenes of Ermenonville. ROUSSEAU
Loved these calm haunts of Solitude and Peace;
Here he has heard the murmurs of the stream,
And the soft rustling of the poplar grove,
When o'er their bending boughs the passing wind
Swept a grey shade. Here if thy breast be full,
If in thine eye the tear devout should gush,

For thirty years secluded from mankind,
Here Marten linger'd. Often have these walls
Echoed his footsteps, as with even tread
He paced around his prison: not to him
Did Nature's fair varieties exist;
He never saw the Sun's delightful beams,
Save when thro' yon high bars it pour'd a sad
And broken splendor. Dost thou ask his crime?
He had rebell'd against the King, and sat
In judgment on him; for his ardent mind
Shaped goodliest plans of happiness on earth,
And peace and liberty. Wild dreams! But such
As PLATO lov'd; such as with holy zeal

The fervent, pale-faced Mother ere she sleep,
Looks out upon the zigzag-lighted square,
The beautiful bare trees, the blue night-air,
The revelation of the star-strewn deep,
World above world, and heaven over heaven.
Between the tree-tops and the skies, her sight
Rests on a steadfast, ruddy-shining light,
High in the tower, an earthly star of even.
Hers is the faith in saints' and angels' power,
And mediating love--she breathes a prayer
For yon tired watcher in the gray old tower.
He the shrewd, skeptic poet unaware

Because my teeth are feebly few
I cannot bolt my grub like you,
But have to chew and chew and chew
As you can see;
Yet every mouthful seems so good
I would not haste it if I could,
And so I salivate my food
With ecstasy.
II
Because my purse is poor in pence
I spend my dough with common-sense,
And live without the least pretence
In simple state;
The things I can't afford to buy
Might speed the day I have to die,
So pleased with poverty am I
And bless my fate.
III

MY thoughts hold mortal strife;
   I do detest my life,
   And with lamenting cries
   Peace to my soul to bring
Oft call that prince which here doth monarchise:
   --But he, grim-grinning King,
Who caitiffs scorns, and doth the blest surprise,
Late having deck'd with beauty's rose his tomb,
Disdains to crop a weed, and will not come.

When I am dead I will not care
Forever more,
If sky be radiantly fair
Or tempest roar.
If my life-hoard in sin be spent,
My wife re-wed,--
I'll be so damned indifferent
When I am dead.
II
When I meet up with dusty doom
What if I rest
In common ditch or marble tomb,
If curst or blest?
Shall my seed be to wealth or fame,
Or gallows led,--
To me it will be all the same
When I am dead.
III
So say for me no pious prayer,

Come to my arms --- is it eve? is it morn?
Is Apollo awake? Is Diana reborn?
Are the streams in full song? Do the woods whisper hush
Is it the nightingale? Is it the thrush?
Is it the smile of the autumn, the blush
Of the spring? Is the world full of peace or alarms?
Come to my arms, Laylah, come to my arms!

Come to my arms, though the hurricane blow.
Thunder and summer, or winter and snow,
It is one to us, one, while our spirits are curled
In the crimson caress: we are fond, we are furled

You can't put in the ground swell of the organ
from the Christiansted, St.Croix, Anglican Church
behind the paratrooper's voice: 'Turned cop
after Vietnam. I made thirty jumps.'
Bells punish the dead street and pigeons lurch
from the stone belfry, opening their chutes,
circling until the rings of ringing stop.
'Salud!' The paratrooper's glass is raised.
The congregation rises to its feet
like a patrol, with scuffling shoes and boots,
repeating orders as the organ thumps:
'Praise Ye the Lord. The Lord's name be praised.'

To J. De P.


Deep in the grass outstretched I lie,
Motionless on the hill;
Above me is a cloudless sky,
Around me all is still:

There is no breath, no sound, no stir,
The drowsy peace to break:
I close my tired eyes--it were
So simple not to wake.

When, foot to wheel and back to wind,
The helmsman dare not look behind,
But hears beyond his compass-light,
The blind bow thunder through the night,
And, like a harpstring ere it snaps,
The rigging sing beneath the caps;
Above the shriek of storm in sail
Or rattle of the blocks blown free,
Set for the peace beyond the gale,
This song the Needle sings the Sea;

Oh, drunken Wave! Oh, driving Cloud!
Rage of the Deep and sterile Rain,
By love upheld, by God allowed,
We go, but we return again!