Poems From The Breakfast Table | Page 4

said no more!?Woman! thy falchion is a glittering eye;?If death lurk in it, oh how sweet to die!?Thou takest hearts as Rudolph took the head;?We die with love, and never dream we're dead!
LATTER-DAY WARNINGS
WHEN legislators keep the law,?When banks dispense with bolts and looks,?When berries--whortle, rasp, and straw--?Grow bigger downwards through the box,--
When he that selleth house or land?Shows leak in roof or flaw in right,--?When haberdashers choose the stand?Whose window hath the broadest light,--
When preachers tell us all they think,?And party leaders all they mean,--?When what we pay for, that we drink,?From real grape and coffee-bean,--
When lawyers take what they would give,?And doctors give what they would take,--?When city fathers eat to live,?Save when they fast for conscience' sake,--
When one that hath a horse on sale?Shall bring his merit to the proof,?Without a lie for every nail?That holds the iron on the hoof,--
When in the usual place for rips?Our gloves are stitched with special care,?And guarded well the whalebone tips?Where first umbrellas need repair,--
When Cuba's weeds have quite forgot?The power of suction to resist,?And claret-bottles harbor not?Such dimples as would hold your fist,--
When publishers no longer steal,?And pay for what they stole before,--?When the first locomotive's wheel?Rolls through the Hoosac Tunnel's bore;--
Till then let Cumming blaze away,?And Miller's saints blow up the globe;?But when you see that blessed day,?Then order your ascension robe
ALBUM VERSES
WHEN Eve had led her lord away,?And Cain had killed his brother,?The stars and flowers, the poets say,?Agreed with one another
To cheat the cunning tempter's art,?And teach the race its duty,?By keeping on its wicked heart?Their eyes of light and beauty.
A million sleepless lids, they say,?Will be at least a warning;?And so the flowers would watch by day,?The stars from eve to morning.
On hill and prairie, field and lawn,?Their dewy eyes upturning,?The flowers still watch from reddening dawn?Till western skies are burning.
Alas! each hour of daylight tells?A tale of shame so crushing,?That some turn white as sea-bleached shells,?And some are always blushing.
But when the patient stars look down?On all their light discovers,?The traitor's smile, the murderer's frown,?The lips of lying lovers,
They try to shut their saddening eyes,?And in the vain endeavor?We see them twinkling in the skies,?And so they wink forever.
A GOOD TIME GOING!
BRAVE singer of the coming time,?Sweet minstrel of the joyous present,?Crowned with the noblest wreath of rhyme,?The holly-leaf of Ayrshire's peasant,?Good by! Good by!--Our hearts and hands,?Our lips in honest Saxon phrases,?Cry, God be with him, till he stands?His feet among the English daisies!
'T is here we part;--for other eyes?The busy deck, the fluttering streamer,?The dripping arms that plunge and rise,?The waves in foam, the ship in tremor,?The kerchiefs waving from the pier,?The cloudy pillar gliding o'er him,?The deep blue desert, lone and drear,?With heaven above and home before him!
His home!--the Western giant smiles,?And twirls the spotty globe to find it;?This little speck the British Isles??'T is but a freckle,--never mind it!?He laughs, and all his prairies roll,?Each gurgling cataract roars and chuckles,?And ridges stretched from pole to pole?Heave till they crack their iron knuckles!
But Memory blushes at the sneer,?And Honor turns with frown defiant,?And Freedom, leaning on her spear,?Laughs louder than the laughing giant?"An islet is a world," she said,?"When glory with its dust has blended,?And Britain keeps her noble dead?Till earth and seas and skies are rended!"
Beneath each swinging forest-bough?Some arm as stout in death reposes,--?From wave-washed foot to heaven-kissed brow?Her valor's life-blood runs in roses;?Nay, let our brothers of the West?Write smiling in their florid pages,?One half her soil has walked the rest?In poets, heroes, martyrs, sages!
Hugged in the clinging billow's clasp,?From sea-weed fringe to mountain heather,?The British oak with rooted grasp?Her slender handful holds together;--?With cliffs of white and bowers of green,?And Ocean narrowing to caress her,?And hills and threaded streams between,--?Our little mother isle, God bless her!
In earth's broad temple where we stand,?Fanned by the eastern gales that brought us,?We hold the missal in our hand,?Bright with the lines our Mother taught us.?Where'er its blazoned page betrays?The glistening links of gilded fetters,?Behold, the half-turned leaf displays?Her rubric stained in crimson letters!
Enough! To speed a parting friend?'T is vain alike to speak and listen;--?Yet stay,--these feeble accents blend?With rays of light from eyes that glisten.?Good by! once more,--and kindly tell?In words of peace the young world's story,--?And say, besides, we love too well?Our mothers' soil, our fathers' glory
THE LAST BLOSSOM
THOUGH young no more, we still would dream?Of beauty's dear deluding wiles;?The leagues of life to graybeards seem?Shorter than boyhood's lingering miles.
Who knows a woman's wild caprice??'It played with Goethe's silvered hair,?And many a Holy Father's "niece"?Has softly smoothed the papal chair.
When sixty bids us sigh in vain?To melt the heart of sweet sixteen,?We think upon those ladies twain?Who loved so well the tough old Dean.
We see the Patriarch's wintry face,?The maid of Egypt's dusky glow,?And dream that Youth and