At midnight an angel was crossing the sky,
And quietly he sang;
The moon and the stars and the concourse of clouds
Paid heed to his heavenly song.

He sang of the bliss of the innocent souls
In heavenly gardens above;
Of almighty God he sang out, and his praise
Was pure and sincere.

He bore in his arms a young soul
To our valley of sorrow and tears;
The young soul remembered the heavenly song
So vivid and yet without words.

And long did it struggle on earth,
With wondrous desire imbued;

I.

WHEN Freedom from her mountain height
Unfurled her standard to the air,
She tore the azure robe of night,
And set the stars of glory there.
She mingled with its gorgeous dyes
The milky baldric of the skies,
And striped its pure celestial white,
With streakings of the morning light;
Then from his mansion in the sun
She called her eagle bearer down,
And gave into his mighty hand,
The symbol of her chosen land.

II.

Majestic monarch of the cloud,
Who rear'st aloft thy regal form,

Beware of those who slyly pilch
In many cunning ways;
Beware of little lyres that filch
From undisputed bays!
Beware the tumbler's beaded brim,
The ass in fiercer fur;
But most of all beware of him
Who makes my pen to stir--
THe Insecure
And Amateur
Implacable Photographer!

Beware lest, thieving for your thirst,
An earwig's in the plum!
Beware of folly, gay at first,
That later makes you glum!
Beware of pits when stars are dim,
The tooth of vagrant cur;
But most of all beware of him

We first saw fire on the tragic slopes
Where the flood-tide of France's early gain,
Big with wrecked promise and abandoned hopes,
Broke in a surf of blood along the Aisne.


The charge her heroes left us, we assumed,
What, dying, they reconquered, we preserved,
In the chill trenches, harried, shelled, entombed,
Winter came down on us, but no man swerved.


Winter came down on us. The low clouds, torn
In the stark branches of the riven pines,
Blurred the white rockets that from dusk till morn

When first thou didst entice to thee my heart,
I thought the service brave;
So many joys I writ down for my part,
Besides what I might have
Out of my stock of natural delights,
Augmented with thy gracious benefits.

I looked on thy furniture so fine,
And made it fine to me;
Thy glorious household-stuff did me entwine,
And 'tice me unto thee.
Such stars I counted mine: both heav'n and earth;
Paid me my wages in a world of mirth.

My pensive SARA ! thy soft cheek reclined
Thus on mine arm, most soothing sweet it is
To sit beside our Cot, our Cot o'ergrown
With white-flower'd Jasmin, and the broad-leav'd Myrtle,
(Meet emblems they of Innocence and Love !)
And watch the clouds, that late were rich with light,
Slow saddenning round, and mark the star of eve
Serenely brilliant (such should Wisdom be)
Shine opposite ! How exquisite the scents
Snatch'd from yon bean-field ! and the world so hush'd !
The stilly murmur of the distant Sea
Tells us of silence.

I tell you a tale to-night
Which a seaman told to me,
With eyes that gleamed in the lanthorn light
And a voice as low as the sea.

You could almost hear the stars
Twinkling up in the sky,
And the old wind woke and moaned in the spars
And the same old waves went by.

Singing the same old song
As ages and ages ago,
While he froze my blood in that deep-sea night
With the things he seemed to know.

A bare foot pattered on deck;
Ropes creaked; then-all grew still,
And he pointed his finger straight in my face

We part, and thou art mine no more!
I go through seas never sought before,
Where stars unknown to our native skies
Startle the mariner's watchful eyes.
Our bark shall over the waters sweep,
And rouse the children of the deep:
Around us, 'midst the silvery spray,
With glittering scales shall the dolphins play.
When scarcely flutters the snowy sail,
Gently waved by the whispering gale,
I shall gaze in the ocean's liquid glass,
And mark the hidden treasures we pass:
The amber and coral groves that glow

Such special sweetness was about
   That day God sent you here,
I knew the lavender was out,
   And it was mid of year.

Their common way the great winds blew,
   The ships sailed out to sea;
Yet ere that day was spent I knew
   Mine own had come to me.

As after song some snatch of tune
   Lurks still in grass or bough,
So, somewhat of the end o' June
   Lurks in each weather now.

The young year sets the buds astir,

From garden-beds I tend, it is not far
To those great ranges where he used to ride;
Time’s shadowy Door still stands a rift ajar,
And Fancy, glancing backward and aside,
May glimpse him whirling in a storm, of dust,
A flashing bronze against a burning sky,
Before a sea of tossing horns up-thrust,
A peril thousand-pronged, to breast or die;
Or lying with locked hands beneath his head,
Watching the stars beside a lonely fire,
About him dim immensity outspread
Within, dim gulfs of question and desire.