Thomas Edward Brown
My Garden
A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot! Rose plot, Fringed pool, Ferned grot The veriest school Of peace; and yet the fool Contends that God is not Not God! in gardens! when the
Risus Dei
Methinks in Him there dwells alway A sea of laughter very deep, Where the leviathans leap, And little children play, Their white feet twinkling on its crisped edge; But in the outer bay The
Specula
When He appoints to meet thee, go thou forth – It matters not If south or north, Bleak waste or sunny plot. Nor think, if haply He thou seek’st be late, He does thee
Jessie
WHEN Jessie comes with her soft breast, And yields the golden keys, Then is it as if God caress’d Twin babes upon His knees Twin babes that, each to other press’d, Just feel the
I bended unto me a Bough
I bended unto me a bough of May, That I might see and smell: It bore it in a sort of way, It bore it very well. But, when I let it backward sway,
Opifex
As I was carving images from clouds, And tinting them with soft ethereal dyes Pressed from the pulp of dreams, one comes, and cries: “Forbear!” and all my heaven with gloom enshrouds. “Forbear!” Thou
If Thou Could'st Empty All Thyself Of Self
If thou could’st empty all thyself of self, Like to a shell dishabited, Then might He find thee on the ocean shelf, And say, “This is not dead,” And fill thee with Himself instead.
Land, Ho!
I know ’tis but a loom of land, Yet is it land, and so I will rejoice, I know I cannot hear His voice Upon the shore, nor see Him stand; Yet is it
Disguises
High stretched upon the swinging yard, I gather in the sheet; But it is hard And stiff, and one cries haste. Then He that is most dear in my regard Of all the crew
Pain
The Man that hath great griefs I pity not; ‘Tis something to be great In any wise, and hint the larger state, Though but in shadow of a shade, God wot! Moreover, while we
Dora
SHE knelt upon her brother’s grave, My little girl of six years old He used to be so good and brave, The sweetest lamb of all our fold; He used to shout, he used
Salve!
TO live within a cave it is most good; But, if God make a day, And some one come, and say, ‘Lo! I have gather’d faggots in the wood!’ E’en let him stay, And
Ibant ObscurŠ¶
To-night I saw three maidens on the beach, Dark-robed descending to the sea, So slow, so silent of all speech, And visible to me Only by that strange drift-light, dim, forlorn, Of the sun’s