Bon Voyage
Child of a line accurst And old as Troy, Bringer of best and worst In wild alloy – Light, like a linnet first, He sang for joy. Thrall to the gilded ease Of every
The Wandering Jew
I saw by looking in his eyes That they remembered everything; And this was how I came to know That he was here, still wandering. For though the figure and the scene Were never
Late Summer
(ALCAICS) Confused, he found her lavishing feminine Gold upon clay, and found her inscrutable; And yet she smiled. Why, then, should horrors Be as they were, without end, her playthings? And why were dead
Karma
Christmas was in the air and all was well With him, but for a few confusing flaws In divers of God’s images. Because A friend of his would neither buy nor sell, Was he
The Torrent
I found a torrent falling in a glen Where the sun’s light shone silvered and leaf-split; The boom, the foam, and the mad flash of it All made a magic symphony; but when I
Her Eyes
Up from the street and the crowds that went, Morning and midnight, to and fro, Still was the room where his days he spent, And the stars were bleak, and the nights were slow.
Another Dark Lady
Think not, because I wonder where you fled, That I would lift a pin to see you there; You may, for me, be prowling anywhere, So long as you show not your little head:
Two Sonnets
I Just as I wonder at the twofold screen Of twisted innocence that you would plait For eyes that uncourageously await The coming of a kingdom that has been, So do I wonder what
Tact
Observant of the way she told So much of what was true, No vanity could long withhold Regard that was her due: She spared him the familiar guide, So easily achieved, That only made
Variations of Greek Themes
I A HAPPY MAN (Carphyllides) When these graven lines you see, Traveler, do not pity me; Though I be among the dead, Let no mournful word be said. Children that I leave behind, And
Octaves
I We thrill too strangely at the master’s touch; We shrink too sadly from the larger self Which for its own completeness agitates And undetermines us; we do not feel We dare not feel
Ben Jonson Entertains a Man from Stratford
You are a friend then, as I make it out, Of our man Shakespeare, who alone of us Will put an ass’s head in Fairyland As he would add a shilling to more shillings,
The Sunken Crown
Nothing will hold him longer-let him go; Let him go down where others have gone down; Little he cares whether we smile or frown, Or if we know, or if we think we know.
Veteran Sirens
The ghost of Ninon would be sorry now To laugh at them, were she to see them here, So brave and so alert for learning how To fence with reason for another year. Age
Haunted House
Here was a place where none would ever come For shelter, save as we did from the rain. We saw no ghost, yet once outside again Each wondered why the other should be so