A bird with azure breast and beak of gold, A joyous stranger, beautiful and shy, Flown from far groves beneath a summer sky, At morn amid our March woods bare and cold Sang like a spirit. Raptures such as hold The arches charmed, and hush the zephyr's sigh, From his enamored throat flowed carelessly In musical low warblings manifold. At length he...Learn More

We sat upon the shore, my friend and I; The lake lay rocking in the morning shine, Odors of gum were round us, and a pine Played music while the waves danced, ceaselessly. Joy of wild woods and waters and blue sky Flowed through our spirits like celestial wine; We talked of poet's hopes and thoughts divine, And he was generous and I was shy. O...Learn More

Along the hushed aisles, little frequented, Except by feet on sacred service bent At Sabbath's hour of praise or sacrament, The gathering pastors move with quiet tread. Such men! see what a lion in that head! What passion in those eyes magnificent! What pride in that imperial brow unbent! This face, what grace and subtle charm inbred; What power...Learn More

Too fairy-light of keel, and swift of sail To bide the winds and currents of the world, At last good-by to fickle wave and gale! Thy bark steers free, with all her wings unfurled, Into the happy deeps through foam-wreaths curled! Thought, like a seraph, radiant at the peak, Leans seaward through the shower of diamond spray Tossed in light scorn...Learn More

O Winter! thou art not that haggard Lear, With stormy beard and countenance of woe, Raving amain, or dumbly crouching low, In hoary desolation mocked with fear! To me thou art the white queen of the year, A stately virgin in her robes of snow, With royal lilies crowned, and all aglow With holy charms, and gems celestial clear. Nor dost thou come...Learn More

What feeble and unhappy bards are we, Who trace our lines with over-cunning hand Upon a narrow strip of seashore sand, Washed over night by strong floods of the sea! We look at length and wonder where they be: They vanish, and we do not understand; Not though we muse the verse divinely grand Of him whose natural breath was poetry,— Shakespeare the...Learn More

All lands are God's lands; yet is this indeed The home express of His divinity; His visible hand redeemed it from the sea, And sowed its fields with freedom's deathless seed. He succored it most swiftly in its need; In field and council men with awe did see His arm made manifest almightily, Scarce veiled in instruments of mortal breed. He laid a...Learn More

A pulseless languor lay upon the sea, The solemn mountains rested in their calm, The mighty forests slumbered, and the palm Above the warm sands brooded breathlessly; The heavens bent down in dark expectancy, Then suddenly the clouds burst 'midst the strain, Drenching the woods with torrents of warm rain, Till in their deeps they roared...Learn More

'Tis not where sculpture rules a world grown dim Fair Hellas lies, so dear to poet's heart,— Not in the galleries of sacred art, Where group the old gods maimed in trunk and limb. Nor is it where enchanted islands swim The warm Ægean waves, and where apart Through rosy mists Olympian heights upstart, And float like dreams on the horizon's rim. Ah,...Learn More

Thou art the friend and comrade, Poesy, For whom I suffer all things, still content If not in vain for thee my light is spent,— The share of heavenly light that fell on me. Thou art my meat, my drink, my liberty; Thou art my garb, thou art my tenement, Wherein I hide all night from floods unpent From lightnings, winds, and scourgings of the...Learn More

On the bare cliffs in lonely revery I wait, and hear far off the smothered shocks Of billows plunging on the stubborn rocks That pillar the ancient gateway to the sea; And there comes o'er me, swift, resistless, free, Again that old fierce soul of storm and flood, With fire and joy exultant in the blood, Erewhile through stormy years my...Learn More

Ah, Poesy! thou glorious, deadly thing, Fair to create and merciless to slay, What have we done to thee, that day by day Thou wearest us with fruitless suffering? Is it for thine own glory thou dost wring These souls with pangs that waste our hearts away, This fairest web of life to fret and fray, Weaving thereof our grave-clothes while we...Learn More