Edmund William Gosse Poems

Between two russet tufts of summer grass,
I watch the world through hot air as through glass,
And by my face sweet lights and colours pass.
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WHAT gift for passionate lovers shall we find?
Not flowers nor books of verse suffice for me,
But splinters of the odorous cedar-tree,
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LIFE, like an overweighted shaken rose,
Falls, in a cloud of colour, to my feet;
Its petals strew my first November snows,
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BESIDE the dusty road of life,
Deflower'd with toil and foul with strife,
Lie hid within a charm of dew
Pure harbours made for me and you.
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WE traced the bleak ridge, to and fro,
Grave forty, gay fourteen;
While yellow larks, in heaven's blue glow,
Like laughing stars were seen,
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THE Past is like a funeral gone by,
The Future comes like an unwelcome guest,
And some men gaze behind them to find rest
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THE soft wind blows
Across the snows,
And turns the palest face to rose;
The wind it goes
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COME to the river-bank with me;
For there are plumed ferns of crescent green,
And in the wine-dark pools are seen
The crimson-spotted trout.
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ONE ballade more before we say good-night,
O dying Muse, one mournful ballade more!
Then let the new men fall to their delight,
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NEIGHBOUR of the near domain,
Stay awhile your passing wain!
Though to give is more your way,
Take a gift from me to-day!
...