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All forgot for recollecting
Just a paltry One—
All forsook, for just a Stranger's
New Accompanying—
Grace of Wealth, and Grace of Station
Less accounted than
An unknown Esteem possessing—
Estimate—Who can—
Home effaced—Her faces dwindled—
Nature—altered small—
Sun—if shone—or Storm—if shattered—
Overlooked I all—
Dropped—my fate—a timid Pebble—
In thy bolder Sea—
Prove—me—Sweet—if I regret it—
Prove Myself—of Thee—
Speaking of marvels, I am alive
together with you, when I might have been
alive with anyone under the sun,
when I might have been Abelard's woman
or the whore of a Renaissance pope
or a peasant wife with not enough food
and not enough love, with my children
dead of the plague. I might have slept
in an alcove next to the man
with the golden nose, who poked it
into the business of stars,
or sewn a starry flag
for a general with wooden teeth.
I might have been the exemplary Pocahontas
or a woman without a name
I Sing the Man that never Equal knew,
Whose Mighty Arms all Asia did subdue,
Whose Conquests through the spacious World do ring,
That City-Raser, King-destroying King,
Who o're the Warlike Macedons did Reign,
And worthily the Name of Great did gain.
This is the Prince (if Fame you will believe,
To ancient Story any credit give.)
Who when the Globe of Earth he had subdu'd,
With Tears the easie Victory pursu'd;
Because that no more Worlds there were to win,
No further Scene to act his Glorys in.
Next, then, the peacock, gilt
With all its feathers. Look, what gorgeous dyes
Flow in the eyes!
And how deep, lustrous greens are splashed and spilt
Along the back, that like a sea-wave's crest
Scatters soft beauty o'er th' emblazoned breast!
A strange fowl! But most fit
For feasts like this, whereby I honor one
Pure as the sun!
Yet glowing with the fiery zeal of it!
Some wine? Your goblet's empty? Let it foam!
It is not often that you come to Rome!
You like the Venice glass?
[As a Tribute of Esteem and Admiration this Poem is inscribed to ROBERT MERRY, Esq. A. M. Member of the Royal Academy at Florence, and Author of the Laurel of Liberty, and the Della Crusca Poems.]
O THOU, to whom superior worth's allied,
Thy Country's honourand the MUSES' pride;
Whose pen gives polish to the varying line
That blends instruction with the song divine;
Whose fancy, glancing o'er the hostile plain,
Plants a fond trophy o'er the mighty slain; I
Or to the daisied lawn directs its way,
Blithe as the songstress of returning day;
A splendid sun betwixt the trees
Long spikes of flame did shoot,
When turning to the fragrant South,
With longing eyes and burning mouth,
I stretched a hand athwart the drouth,
And plucked at cooling fruit.
So thirst was quenched, and hastening on
With strength returned to me,
I set my face against the noon,
And reached a denser forest soon;
Which dipped into a still lagoon
Hard by the sooming sea.
All day the ocean beat on bar
And bank of gleaming sand;
Yet that lone pool was always mild,
FAIR stood the wind for France
When we our sails advance,
Nor now to prove our chance
Longer will tarry;
But putting to the main,
At Caux, the mouth of Seine,
With all his martial train
Landed King Harry.
And taking many a fort,
Furnish'd in warlike sort,
Marcheth tow'rds Agincourt
In happy hour;
Skirmishing day by day
With those that stopp'd his way,
Where the French gen'ral lay
With all his power.
SHE wanders in the April woods,
That glisten with the fallen shower;
She leans her face against the buds,
She stops, she stoops, she plucks a flower.
She feels the ferment of the hour:
She broodeth when the ringdove broods;
The sun and flying clouds have power
Upon her cheek and changing moods.
She cannot think she is alone,
As o’er her senses warmly steal
Floods of unrest she fears to own,
And almost dreads to feel.
Among the summer woodlands wide
Anew she roams, no more alone;
I will be the gladdest thing
Under the sun!
I will touch a hundred flowers
And not pick one.
I will look at cliffs and clouds
With quiet eyes,
Watch the wind bow down the grass,
And the grass rise.
And when lights begin to show
Up from the town,
I will mark which must be mine,
And then start down!
Dawn gilded over dunes of sand
That border Mobile Bay
The fleet, which under Farragut
In expectation lay.
For ere that rising sun should set,
Full many a sailor bold
Should perish, leaving but a name
On history's page of gold.
Others have sung and yet shall sing
Of Farragut's renown:
How to the Hartford's maintop lashed
He gained his conqueror's crown.
Let others sing those deeds while we,
In sorrow and in pride,
Tell how one gallant gentleman
With high decorum died.