Henry Livingston

To his charming black-eyed niece
Uncle Harry wishest peace!
Wishes roses over strow'd
O'er her sublunary road!
...

BEYOND where billows roll or tempests vex
Is gone the gentlest of the gentle sex!
---Her brittle bark on life's wild ocean tost
Unequal to the conflict soon was lost.
...

To my little niece Sally Livingston, on the death of a little serenading wren she admired.


Hasty pilgrim stop thy pace
...

Believe me, dear patrons, I have wand'red too far,
Without any compass, or planet or star;
My dear native village I scarcely can see
So I'll hie to my hive like the tempest-tost bee.
...

Take the name of the swain, a forlorn witless elf
Who was chang'd to a flow'r for admiring himself.
A part deem'd essential in each lady's dress
With what maidens cry when they wish to say yes.
...

E v'ry grace in her combine,
L ove and truth and friendship join,
I n one source without reserve,
Z ealous all her friends to serve,
...

Of RISPAH. (who had been the concubine of King SAUL) when DAVID hanged her children, because their father had done amiss.


From morn to eve from eve to rosy morn,
...

With the ladies' permission, most humbly I'd mention
How much we're obliged by all their attention;
We sink with the weight of the huge obligation
Too long & too broad to admit compensation.
...

The legislators pass along
A solemn, self-important throng!
Just raised from the common mass,
They feel themselves another class.
...

A vine from noblest lineage sprung
And with the choicest clusters hung,
In purple rob'd, reclining lay,
And catch'd the noontide's fervid ray;
...

HORACE.

While I was pleasing to your arms,
Nor any youth, of happier charms,
...

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all thro' the house,
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
...

Master Timmy brisk and airy
Blythe as Oberon the fairy
On thy head thy cousin wishes
Thousand and ten thousand blisses.
...

An elegy on the death of MONTGOMERY TAPPEN who dies at Poughkeepsie on the 20th of Nov. 1784 in the ninth year of his age.


The sweetest, gentlest, of the youthful train,
...

WELLCOME, wellcome, happy day,
Wherein love-sick maidens may
Unrestrained tell their swains
All their fondness, all their pains.
...

On this thy natal day permit a friend -
A brother - with thy joys his own to blend:
In all gladness he would wish to share
As willing in thy griefs a part to bear.
...

Letter to my Brother Beekman, who then lived with Mr. Schenk
at New Lebanon - 1786
...

Her little bark on Life's wide Ocean tossed,
In the unequal struggle soon was lost,
Severe its conflict! Much alas it bore,
Then sunk beneath the storm and rose no more.
...

In long gone years a fox and crane
Were bound in friendship's golden chain;
Whene'er they met, the fox would bow
And madame Crane would curtsie low-
...

I rise when I please, when I please I lie down,
Nor seek, what I care not a rush for, renown;
The rattle called wealth I have learnt to despise,
Nor aim to be either important or wise.
...