I asked for peace and a life of quiet dreaming
But a sword was forged for my hand —
When the dust of battle dies in the star's cold gleaming,
Shall I understand?

— Please screen the fire when you come to bed,
The sparks may fly, — he said,
And she who many years had screened the fires
Of perilous desires,
Rose silently to cage the last red spark —
And followed through the dark.

When I am lost in the deep body of the mist on a hill,
The universe seems built with me as its pillar.

Am I the god upon the face of the deep — nay, deepless deepness in the beginning?

Three charms I have to turn a dark world bright —
The thought of white ships sailing out to sea,
The moonlit mountains on a summer night,
And the remembrance of your love for me.

I have known beauty, I have walked with love
And I have held a child against my breast—
How then shall I fear pain or grief or death,
Being so blest?

Said a bad little youngster named Beauchamp:
" Those jelly-tarts, how shall I reauchamp?
To my parents I'd go,
But they always say " No,"
No matter how much I beseauchamp. "

The Gothic girders of Spider Castle
Are fretted with pulver of rain, harassed with rain-dust glitter;
The Gothic girders of Spider Castle
Sag silver; the fog drips beauty into the sparrow's twitter;
Lustrously dank is the snail's horn, his armor glistens;
Now the hush, soaked silver: and still my heart listens and listens.

The blade is sharp, the reaper stout,
And every daisy dies.
Their souls are fluttering about —
We call them butterflies.

Like the eyes of wolves at night on a road, so my own days are glimmering before me .
Glimmering from afar my lonely days approach me in the wide snowy field .
Like the eyes of wolves in a forest at night my world sparkles before me so shining, so cold .

I'm going towards the night through bright mornings and sunny days; but with me there is a whole generation of companions. So I proceed — without question or restraint .
Forward I go, concealing my fear, as soldiers do on a trembling bridge; lonesome, lost, though marching together with legions — and in another's gaze I recognize my fear .