When you are gone, there is nor bloom nor leaf, Nor singing sea at night, nor silver birds; And I can only stare, and shape my grief In little words. I cannot conjure loveliness,

Sleep, pretty lady, the night is enfolding you; Drift, and so lightly, on crystalline streams. Wrapped in its perfumes, the darkness is holding you; Starlight bespangles the way of your dreams. Chorus the nightingales,

Love is sharper than stones or sticks; Lone as the sea, and deeper blue; Loud in the night as a clock that ticks; Longer-lived than the Wandering Jew. Show me a love was done

They say of me, and so they should, It’s doubtful if I come to good. I see acquaintances and friends Accumulating dividends, And making enviable names In science, art, and parlor games. But I,

There’s a place I know where the birds swing low, And wayward vines go roaming, Where the lilacs nod, and a marble god Is pale, in scented gloaming. And at sunset there comes a

In youth, it was a way I had To do my best to please, And change, with every passing lad, To suit his theories. But now I know the things I know, And do

I cannot rest, I cannot rest In straight and shiny wood, My woven hands upon my breast The dead are all so good! The earth is cool across their eyes; They lie there quietly.

I always saw, I always said If I were grown and free, I’d have a gown of reddest red As fine as you could see, To wear out walking, sleek and slow, Upon a

Unto seventy years and seven, Hide your double birthright well- You, that are the brat of Heaven And the pampered heir to Hell. Let your rhymes be tinsel treasures, Strung and seen and thrown

Little things that no one needs Little things to joke about Little landscapes, done in beads. Little morals, woven out, Little wreaths of gilded grass, Little brigs of whittled oak Bottled painfully in glass;

This I say, and this I know: Love has seen the last of me. Love’s a trodden lane to woe, Love’s a path to misery. This I know, and knew before, This I tell

Lady, lady, should you meet One whose ways are all discreet, One who murmurs that his wife Is the lodestar of his life, One who keeps assuring you That he never was untrue, Never

So take my vows and scatter them to sea; Who swears the sweetest is no more than human. And say no kinder words than these of me: “Ever she longed for peace, but was

Now this must be the sweetest place From here to heaven’s end; The field is white and flowering lace, The birches leap and bend, The hills, beneath the roving sun, From green to purple

When I was young and bold and strong, Oh, right was right, and wrong was wrong! My plume on high, my flag unfurled, I rode away to right the world. “Come out, you dogs,

If I should labor through daylight and dark, Consecrate, valorous, serious, true, Then on the world I may blazon my mark; And what if I don’t, and what if I do?

Oh, I should like to ride the seas, A roaring buccaneer; A cutlass banging at my knees, A dirk behind my ear. And when my captives’ chains would clank I’d howl with glee and

They say He was a serious child, And quiet in His ways; They say the gentlest lady smiled To hear the neighbors’ praise. The coffers of her heart would close Upon their smaliest word.

The days will rally, wreathing Their crazy tarantelle; And you must go on breathing, But I’ll be safe in hell. Like January weather, The years will bite and smart, And pull your bones together

My hand, a little raised, might press a star- Where I may look, the frosted peaks are spun, So shaped before Olympus was begun, Spanned each to each, now, by a silver bar. Thus

If it shine or if it rain, Little will I care or know. Days, like drops upon a pane, Slip, and join, and go. At my door’s another lad; Here’s his flower in my

A single flow’r he sent me, since we met. All tenderly his messenger he chose; Deep-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet – One perfect rose. I knew the language of the floweret; ‘My

Oh, there once was a lady, and so I’ve been told, Whose lover grew weary, whose lover grew cold. “My child,” he remarked, “though our episode ends, In the manner of men, I suggest

Here in my heart I am Helen; I’m Aspasia and Hero, at least. I’m Judith, and Jael, and Madame de Stael; I’m Salome, moon of the East. Here in my soul I am Sappho;