As an April garden
Breathes the scent of rain -
Rain that calls her treasures
...
Phew! 'T'is a stuffy and a stupid place,
This social edifice by Custom wrought -
This fenced enclosure wherein all are caught,
The great and small, the noble and the base,
...
Twas long ago, in the summer-time,
On a day as sad as this,
That I laid my babe in its father's arms,
And he gave it his farewell kiss;
...
Bright eyes, sweet lips, with many fevers fill
The young blood, running wildly, as it must;
But lips and eyes beget a strange distrust.
...
Awawe-worn boulder, with green sea-moss wrapping
A silken mantle o'er its jagged sides;
And silvery, seething waters softly lapping
Through gulfs and channels hollow'd by the tides:
...
Bright eyes, sweet lips, with sudden fevers fill
My strong blood, running wildly, as it must;
But lips and eyes too soon beget distrust.
...
Poor, staggering brute, whom one and all disdain!
Maybe 'twas outraged Nature bade him slake.
...
Is it a virtue, as the sages say,
The 'trivial round and common task' to ply,
And for no wider walk of life to sigh
Than we were born to; sweetly, day by day,
...
Perchance for dear Life's sake - and life is sweet -
When work had failed and roads were deep in snow,
And this meant food and fire, she fell so low -
That painted creature of the midnight street.
...