(FROM THE DRAMA OF MIZPAH) AHASUERAS Tell me thy name! ESTHER My name, great sire, is Esther. AHASUERAS So thou art Esther? Esther! ’tis a nameBreathed into sound as softly as a sigh.A woman’s name should melt upon the lipsLike Love’s first kisses, and thy countenanceIs fit companion for so sweet a name! ESTHER Thou […]

There was a man, it was said one time,Who went astray in his youthful prime.Can the brain keep cool and the heart keep quietWhen the blood is a river that’s running riot?And boys will be boys, the old folks say,And a man is the better who’s had his day The sinner reformed; and the preacher […]

[A room in a private house. A maiden sitting before a fire meditating.] MAIDEN Now have I fully fixed upon my part.Good-bye to dreams; for me a life of art!Beloved art! Oh, realm serene and fair,Above the mean and sordid world of care,Above earth’s small ambitions and desires!Art! art! the very word my soul inspires!From […]

THE WIFE The house is like a garden,The children are the flowers,The gardener should come methinksAnd walk among his bowers,Oh! lock the door on worryAnd shut your cares away,Not time of year, but love and cheer,Will make a holiday. THE HUSBAND Impossible! You women do not knowThe toil it takes to make a business grow.I […]

False! Good God, I am dreaming!No, no, it never can be–You who are so true in seeming,You, false to your vows and me?My wife and my fair boy’s motherThe star of my life–my queen–To yield herself to anotherLike some light Magdalene! Proofs! what are proofs–I defy them!They never can shake my trust;If you look in […]

As the grey twilight, tiptoed down the deepAnd shadowy valley, to the day’s dark end,She whom I thought my ever-faithful friend,Fair-browed, calm-eyed and mother-bosomed Sleep,Met me with smiles. ‘Poor longing heart, I keepSweet joy for you,’ she murmured. ‘I will sendOne whom you love, with your own soul to blendIn visions, as the night hours […]

Well, Mabel, ’tis over and ended–The ball I wrote was to be;And oh! it was perfectly splendid–If you could have been here to see.I’ve a thousand things to write youThat I know you are wanting to hear,And one, that is sure to delight you–I am wearing Joe’s diamond, my dear! Yes, mamma is quite ecstaticThat […]

I knew it the first of the summer,I knew it the same at the end,That you and your love were plighted,But couldn’t you be my friend?Couldn’t we sit in the twilight,Couldn’t we walk on the shoreWith only a pleasant friendshipTo bind us, and nothing more? There was not a word of follySpoken between us two,Though […]

In his great cushioned chair by the fenderAn old man sits dreaming to-night,His withered hands, licked by the tenderWarm rays of the red anthracite,Are folded before him, all listless;His dim eyes are fixed on the blaze,While over him sweeps the resistlessFlood-tide of old days. He hears not the mirth in the hallway,He hears not the […]

Master of sweet and loving lore,Give us the open mindTo know religion means no more,No less, than being kind. Give us the comprehensive sightThat sees another’s need;And let our aim to set things rightProve God inspired our creed. Give us the soul to know our kinThat dwell in flock and herd,The voice to fight man’s […]

What is right living? Just to do your bestWhen worst seems easier. To bear the illsOf daily life with patient cheerfulnessNor waste dear time recounting them.To talkOf hopeful things when doubt is in the air.To count your blessings often, giving thanks,And to accept your sorrows silently,Nor question why you suffer. To acceptThe whole of life […]

The sun rode high in a cloudless skyOf a perfect summer morn.She stood and gazed out into the street,And wondered why she was born.On the topmost branch of a maple-treeThat close by the window grew,A robin called to his mate enthralled:“I love but you, but you, but you.” A soft look came in her hardened […]

Not great Vesuvius, in all his ire,Nor all the centuries, could hide your shame.There is the little window where you came,With eyes that woke the demon of desire,And lips like rose leaves, fashioned out of fire;And from the lava leaps the molten flameOf your old sins. The walls cry out your name –Your face seems […]

At times I am the mother of the world;And mine seem all its sorrows, and its fears.That rose, which in each mother-heart is curled,The rose of pity, opens with my tears,And, waking in the night, I lie and harkTo the lone sobbing, and the wild alarms,Of my World-child, a wailing in the dark:The child I […]

I cried, ‘Dear Angel, lead me to the heights,And spur me to the top.’The Angel answered, ‘StopAnd set thy house in order; make it fairFor absent ones who may be speeding there.Then will we talk of heights.’ I put my house in order. ‘Now lead on!’The Angel said, ‘Not yet;Thy garden is besetBy thorns and […]

She rose up in the early dawn,And white and silently she movedAbout the house. Four men had goneTo battle for the land they loved,And she, the mother and the wife,Waited for tidings from the strife.How still the house seemed! and her treadWas like the footsteps of the dead. The long day passed, the dark night […]

Two thousand years had passed since Christ was born,When suddenly there rose a mighty hostOf women, sweeping to a central goalAs many rivers sweep on to the sea.They came from mountains, valleys, and from coasts,And from all lands, all nations, and all ranks,Speaking all languages, but thinking one.And that one language–Peace. ‘Listen,’ they said,And straightway […]

Vast was the wealth I carried in life’s pack–Youth, health, ambition, hope and trust; but TimeAnd Fate, those robbers fit for any crime,Stole all, and left me but the empty sack.Before me lay a long and lonely trackOf darkling hills and barren steeps to climb;Behind me lay in shadows the sublimeLost lands of Love’s delight. […]

When I pass from earth away,Palsied though I be and grey,May my spirit keep so youngThat my failing, faltering tongueFrames that prayer so dear to me,Taught me at my mother’s knee:“Now I lay me down to sleep,”(Passing to Eternal restOn the loving parent breast)“I pray the Lord my soul to keep;”(From all danger safe and […]

Once in a time of trouble and of careI dreamed I talked with God about my pain;With sleepland courage, daring to complainOf what I deemed ungracious and unfair.‘Lord, I have grovelled on my knees in prayerHour after hour,’ I cried; ‘yet all in vain;No hand leads up to heights I would attain,No path is shown […]