Topic(s) of this poem: march

The reticent volcano keeps

The reticent volcano keeps
His never slumbering plan –
Confided are his projects pink
To no precarious man.

If nature will not tell the tale
Jehovah told to her
Can human nature not survive
Without a listener?

Admonished by her buckled lips
Let every babbler be
The only secret people keep
Is Immortality.

Remembrance has a Rear and Front

Remembrance has a Rear and Front –
‘Tis something like a House –
It has a Garret also
For Refuse and the Mouse.

Besides the deepest Cellar
That ever Mason laid –
Look to it by its Fathoms
Ourselves be not pursued –

Oh Shadow on the Grass

Oh Shadow on the Grass,
Art thou a Step or not?
Go make thee fair my Candidate
My nominated Heart –
Oh Shadow on the Grass
While I delay guessing
Some other thou wilts consecrate –
Oh Unelected Face –

These Fevered Days – to take them to the Forest

These Fevered Days – to take them to the Forest
Where Waters cool around the mosses crawl –
And the shade is all that devastates the stillness
Seems it sometimes this would be all

Not Sickness stains the Brave,

Not Sickness stains the Brave,
Nor any Dart,
Nor Doubt of Scene to come,
But an adjourning Heart –

Glory is that bright tragic thing

Glory is that bright tragic thing
That for an instant
Means Dominion –
Warms some poor name
That never felt the Sun,
Gently replacing
In oblivion –

Immured in Heaven!

Immured in Heaven!
What a Cell!
Let every Bondage be,
Thou sweetest of the Universe,
Like that which ravished thee!

The Devil – had he fidelity

The Devil – had he fidelity
Would be the best friend –
Because he has ability –
But Devils cannot mend –
Perfidy is the virtue
That would but he resign
The Devil – without question
Were thoroughly divine

Of so divine a Loss

Of so divine a Loss
We enter but the Gain,
Indemnity for Loneliness
That such a Bliss has been.

Could mortal lip divine

Could mortal lip divine
The undeveloped Freight
Of a delivered syllable
‘Twould crumble with the weight.

Ended, ere it began –

Ended, ere it began –
The Title was scarcely told
When the Preface perished from Consciousness
The Story, unrevealed –

Had it been mine, to print!
Had it been yours, to read!
That it was not Our privilege
The interdict of God –

The Clover’s simple Fame

The Clover’s simple Fame
Remembered of the Cow –
Is better than enameled Realms
Of notability.
Renown perceives itself
And that degrades the Flower –
The Daisy that has looked behind
Has compromised its power –

By the homely gift and hindered Words

 

-By the homely gift and hindered Words
The human heart is told
Of Nothing –
‘Nothing’ is the force
That renovates the World –

Speech is one symptom of Affection

Speech is one symptom of Affection
And Silence one –
The most perfect communication
Is heard of none –

Exists and its indorsement
Is had within –
Behold, said the Apostle,
Yet had not seen!

 

As subtle as tomorrow

As subtle as tomorrow
That never came,
A warrant, a conviction,
Yet but a name.

A train went through a burial gate

A train went through a burial gate,
A bird broke forth and sang,
And trilled, and quivered, and shook his throat
Till all the churchyard rang;

And then adjusted his little notes,
And bowed and sang again.
Doubtless, he thought it meet of him
To say good-bye to men.

I thought the Train would never come

I thought the Train would never come
How slow the whistle sang –
I don’t believe a peevish Bird
So whimpered for the Spring –
I taught my heart a hundred times
Precisely what to say –
Provoking Lover, when you came
Its Treatise flew away
To hide my strategy too late
To wiser be too soon –
For miseries so halcyon
The happiness atone –

As old as Woe

As old as Woe –
How old is that?
Some eighteen thousand years –
As old as Bliss
How old is that
They are of equal years

Together chiefest they ard found
But seldom side by side
From neither of them tho’ he tries
Can Human nature hide

Best Witchcraft is Geometry

A Spider sewed at Night

A Spider sewed at Night
Without a Light
Upon an Arc of White.

If Ruff it was of Dame
Or Shroud of Gnome
Himself himself informs.

Of Immortality
His Strategy
Was Physiognomy.

The Beggar at the Door for Fame

The Beggar at the Door for Fame
Were easily supplied
But Bread is that Diviner thing
Disclosed to be denied

Whether they have forgotten

Whether they have forgotten
Or are forgetting now
Or never remembered –
Safer not to know –

Miseries of conjecture
Are a softer woe
Than a Fact of Iron
Hardened with I know –

Twas comfort in her Dying Room

‘Twas comfort in her Dying Room
To hear the living Clock –
A short relief to have the wind
Walk boldly up and knock –
Diversion from the Dying Theme
To hear the children play –
But wrong the more
That these could live
And this of ours must die.

Too cold is this

Too cold is this
To warm with Sun –
Too stiff to bent be,
To joint, this Agate was a work –
Outstaring Masonry –

How went the Agile Kernel out
Contusion of the Husk
Nor Rip, nor wrinkle indicate
But just an Asterisk.

The Blue Jay

No brigadier throughout the year
So civic as the jay.
A neighbor and a warrior too,
With shrill felicity

Pursuing winds that censure us
On a February day,
The brother of the universe
Was never blown away.

The snow and he are intimate;
I’ve often seen them play
When heaven looked upon us all
With such severity,

I felt apology were due
To an insulted sky,
Whose pompous frown was nutriment
To their temerity.

The pillow of this daring head
Are pungent evergreens;
His larder — terse and militant —
Unknown, refreshing things;

His character a tonic,
His future a dispute;
Unfair and immortality
That leaves this neighbor out.

Witchcraft Has Not A Pedigree

Witchcraft has not a pedigree,
‘Tis early as our breath,
And mourners meet it going out
The moment of our death.

 

‘Tomorrow’ – whose location

‘Tomorrow’ – whose location
The Wise deceives
Though its hallucination
Is last that leaves –
Tomorrow – thou Retriever
Of every tear –
Of Alibi art thou
Or ownest where?

As from the earth the light Balloon

Luck is not chance

The Mushroom is the Elf of Plants

Topic(s) of this poem: plants

It stole along so stealthy

It stole along so stealthy
Suspicion it was done
Was dim as to the wealthy
Beginning not to own –

The Work Of Her That Went

The Work of Her that went,
The Toil of Fellows are done –
In Ovens green our Mother bakes,
By Fires of the Sun.

High From The Earth I Heard A Bird

High from the earth I heard a bird;
He trod upon the trees
As he esteemed them trifles,
And then he spied a breeze,
And situated softly
Upon a pile of wind
Which in a perturbation
Nature had left behind.
A joyous-going fellow
I gathered from his talk,
Which both of benediction
And badinage partook,
Without apparent burden,
I learned, in leafy wood
He was the faithful father
Of a dependent brood;
And this untoward transport
His remedy for care,—
A contrast to our respites.
How different we are!

A Sickness Of This World It Most Occasions

A Sickness of this World it most occasions
When Best Men die.
A Wishfulness their far Condition
To occupy.

A Chief indifference, as Foreign
A World must be
Themselves forsake – contented,
For Deity.

It stole along so stealthy