May be, in my previous a-being,
I’ve cut the throats of my Mom and Dad,
If in this one – Lord of all the living! --
I have been doomed to suffering like that.

If I call for dogs of mine, aloud,
Or just try my own horse to see,
Not obeying all my signs and shouts,
They would promptly run away from me.

If I come to the enchanting foam
Of my native and well-known sea,
Then the sea would blacken from the woe
And fast go back, away from me.

My day looks like looks a man extinguished,

"Like clouds o'er the South are the nations who reign
On fair islands that we would command;
But clouds that are darker and denser than these
Have sailed from an Isle in the Northern Seas
And rest on our Southern Land.

Low in dust is our Goddess of Liberty hurled
At our feet, and the time is at hand,
When we, the proud sons of the southern world,
Beneath a proud banner of freedom unfurled
And true to each other shall stand.

If e'er in the ranks of the Right we advance;
Though our enemies come like a flood,

786

Severer Service of myself
I—hastened to demand
To fill the awful Vacuum
Your life had left behind—

I worried Nature with my Wheels
When Hers had ceased to run—
When she had put away Her Work
My own had just begun.

I strove to weary Brain and Bone—
To harass to fatigue
The glittering Retinue of nerves—
Vitality to clog

To some dull comfort Those obtain
Who put a Head away
They knew the Hair to—
And forget the color of the Day—

Affliction would not be appeased—
The Darkness braced as firm

1918


Seven Watchmen sitting in a tower,
Watching what had come upon mankind,
Showed the Man the Glory and the Power,
And bade him shape the Kingdom to his mind.
"All things on Earth your will shall win you."
('Twas so their council ran)
" But the Kingdom--the Kingdom is within you,"
Said the Man's own mind to the Man.
For time--and some time--
As it was in the bitter years before
So it shall be in the over-sweetened hour--
That a man's mind is wont to tell him more
Than Seven Watchmen sitting in a tower.

We have climbed the mountain.
There's nothing more to do.
It is terrible to come down
To the valley
Where, amidst many flowers,
One thinks of snow,

As formerly, amidst snow,
Climbing the mountain,
One thought of flowers,
Tremulous, ruddy with dew,
In the valley.
One caught their scent coming down.

It is difficult to adjust, once down,
To the absense of snow.
Clear days, from the valley,
One looks up at the mountain.
What else is there to do?
Prayer wheels, flowers!

Let the flowers

Our great work, the Otia Merseiana,
Edited by learned Mister Sampson,
And supported by Professor Woodward,
Is financed by numerous Bogus Meetings
Hastily convened by Kuno Meyer
To impose upon the Man of Business.

All in vain! The accomplished Man of Business
Disapproves of Otia Merseiana,
Turns his back on Doctor Kuno Meyer;
Cannot be enticed by Mister Sampson,
To be present at the Bogus Meetings,
Though attended by Professor Woodward.

Little cares the staid Professor Woodward:

Once again have I roamed thro' the old-fashioned house,
Where my grandfather spent his ninety years.
There are strangers in charge, and the change they have wrought--
Oh! it saddens me, even to tears.
Dear old clock! when they found you were speechless from grief,
Then they went and swapped you off, case and all.
For that vain, stuck-up thing
(tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick),
For that vain, stuck-up thing on the wall.

Grandfather sleeps in his grave;
Strange steps resound in the hall!
And there's that vain, stuck-up thing

From the Greek Anthologies


Swifter than aught 'neath the sun the car of Simonides moved
him.
Two things he could not out-run--Death and a Woman who
loved him.

There is a book, who runs may read,
Which heavenly truth imparts,
And all the lore its scholars need,
Pure eyes and Christian hearts.

The works of God above, below,
Within us and around,
Are pages in that book, to show
How God Himself is found.

The glorious sky embracing all
Is like the Maker's love,
Wherewith encompassed, great and small
In peace and order move.

The Moon above, the Church below,
A wondrous race they run,
But all their radiance, all their glow,
Each borrows of its Sun.

It's the day of the ram
and the head of the year
Rosh Ha'Shanah at
services I sat next to
Mel Torme who outshone
all comers with his bar
mitzvah heroics while on
my left is Barnett Newman
big talker whose favorite
subjects include the horses
and the stock market he
knows the odds the women
are seated upstairs this is
an orthodox congregation
very serious I make
eye contact with the wife
of Menelaus who runs off
with Paris confident I'm Paris.