rainbow

I wish I could take a quiet corner in the heart of my baby's very
own world.
I know it has stars that talk to him, and a sky that stoops
down to his face to amuse him with its silly clouds and rainbows.
Those who make believe to be dumb, and look as if they never
could move, come creeping to his window with their stories and with
trays crowded with bright toys.
I wish I could travel by the road that crosses baby's mind,
and out beyond all bounds;
Where messengers run errands for no cause between the kingdoms

It is a year dear one, since you afar
Went out beyond my yearning mortal sight­
A wondrous year! perchance in many a star
You have sojourned, or basked within the light
Of mightier suns; it may be you have trod
The glittering pathways of the Pleiades,
And through the Milky Way's white mysteries
Have walked at will, fire-shod.

You may have gazed in the immortal eyes
Of prophets and of martyrs; talked with seers
Learned in all the lore of Paradise,
The infinite wisdom of eternal years;

Be not angry with me that I bear
   Your colours everywhere,
   All through each crowded street,
   And meet
   The wonder-light in every eye,
   As I go by.

Each plodding wayfarer looks up to gaze,
   Blinded by rainbow haze,
   The stuff of happiness,
   No less,
   Which wraps me in its glad-hued folds
   Of peacock golds.

Before my feet the dusty, rough-paved way
   Flushes beneath its gray.
   My steps fall ringed with light,
   So bright,
   It seems a myriad suns are strown

496

As far from pity, as complaint—
As cool to speech—as stone—
As numb to Revelation
As if my Trade were Bone—

As far from time—as History—
As near yourself—Today—
As Children, to the Rainbow's scarf—
Or Sunset's Yellow play

To eyelids in the Sepulchre—
How dumb the Dancer lies—
While Color's Revelations break—
And blaze—the Butterflies!

WHEN the sap runs up the tree.
And the vine runs o’er the wall,
When the blossom draws the bee,
From the forest comes a call,
Wild, and clear, and sweet, and strange,
Many-tongued and murmuring
Like the river in the range—
’Tis the joyous voice of Spring!
On the boles of grey, old trees,
See the flying sunbeams play
Mystic, soundless melodies—
A fantastic march and gay;
But the young leaves hear them—hark
How they rustle, every one!—
And the sap beneath the bark

Fingal when very young, making a voyage to the Orkney Islands, was driven by stress of weather into a bay of Scandinavia, near the residence of Starno, king of Lochlin. Starno invites Fingal to a feast. Fingal, doubting the faith of the king, and mindful of a former breach of hospitality, refuses to go. — Starno gathers together his tribes; Fingal resolves to defend himself. — Night coming on, Duth-maruno proposes to Fingal to observe the motions of the enemy. — The king himself undertakes the watch.

The April rain, the April rain,
Comes slanting down in fitful showers,
Then from the furrow shoots the grain,
And banks are fledged with nestling flowers;
And in grey shaw and woodland bowers
The cuckoo through the April rain
Calls once again.

The April sun, the April sun,
Glints through the rain in fitful splendour,
And in grey shaw and woodland dun
The little leaves spring forth and tender
Their infant hands, yet weak and slender,
For warmth towards the April sun,
One after one.

[sung to tune: "All Saints New"]



Our fathers, in the years grown dim, reared slowly, wall by wall
A holy dwelling-place for Him, that filleth all in all.
They wrought His house of faith and prayer, the rainbow round the Throne,
A precious temple builded fair on Christ the Cornerstone.

The Angel of the Golden Reed hath found the measure strait'
He hears the Great Foundation plead for ampler wall and gate.
The living pillars of the Truth grown on from morn to morn,

Come with me, and we will blow
Lots of bubbles, as we go;
Bubbles bright as ever Hope
Drew from fancy -- or from soap;
Bright as e'er the South Sea sent
from its frothy element!
Come with me, and we will blow
Lots of bubbles, as we go.
Mix the lather, Johnny W--lks,
Thou, who rhym'st so well to bilks;
Mix the lather - who can be
Fitter for such task than thee,
Great M.P. for Sudsbury!

For the frothy charm is ripe,
Puffing Peter bring thy pipe, --
Thou, whom ancient Coventry,

Like a great rock which looming o'er the deep
Casts his eternal shadow on the strands,
And veiled in cloud inexorably stands,
While vaulting round his adamantine steep
Embattled breakers clamorously leap,
Sun-garlanded and hope-uplifted bands,
But soon with waters shattered in the sands
Slowly recoiling back to ocean creep:

So sternly dost thou tower above us, Fate!
For still our eager hearts exultant beat,
Borne in the hurrying tide of life elate,
And dashing break against thy marble feet.