PART I She was a light and wanton maid:Not one whom fickle Love betrayed,For indolence was her undoer.Fair, frivolous, and very poor,She scorned the thought of toil, in youth,And chose the path that leads from truth. More women fall from want of goldThan love leads wrong, if truth were told;More women sin for gay attireThan […]

When in the even ways of lifeThe old world jogs along,Our little coloured flags we flaunt:Our little separate selves we vaunt:Each pipes his native song.And jealousy and greed and prideJoin their ungodly hands,And this round lovely world divideInto opposing lands. But let some crucial hour of painSound from the tower of time,Then consciousness of brotherhoodWakes […]

Yea, she and I have broken God’s command,And in His sight are branded with our shame.And yet I do not even know her name,Nor ever in my life have touched her handOr brushed her garments. But I chanced to standBeside her in the throng! A sweet, swift flameShot from her flesh to mine–and hers the […]

If you listen you will hear, from east to west,Growing sounds of discontent and deep unrest.It is just the progress-driven plough of God,Tearing up the well-worn custom-bounded sod;Shaping out each old tradition-trodden trackInto furrows, fertile furrows, rich and black.Oh, what harvests they will yieldWhen they widen to a field. They will widen, they will broaden, […]

The birds laugh loud and long togetherWhen Fashion’s followers speed awayAt the first cool breath of autumn weather.Why, this is the time, cry the birds, to stay!When the deep calm sea and the deep sky overBoth look their passion through sun-kissed space,As a blue-eyed maid and her blue-eyed loverMight each gaze into the other’s face. […]

There never was success so nobly gained,Or victory so free from selfish dross,But in the winning some one had been painedOr some one suffered loss. There never was so nobly planned a fete,Or festal throng with hearts on pleasure bent,But some neglected one outside the gateWept tears of discontent. There never was a bridal morning […]

God, may Thy loving Spirit work,In heart of Russian, and of Turk,Until throughout each clime and land,Armenian and Jew may stand,And claim the right of every soulTo seek by its own path, the goal.Parts of the Universal Force,Rills from the same eternal SourceBack to that Source, all races go.God, help Thy world to see it […]

A waft of perfume from a bit of laceMoved lightly by a passing woman’s hand;And on the common street, a sensuous graceShone suddenly from some lost time and land. Tall structures changed to dome and parapet;The stern-faced Church an oracle became;In sheltered alcoves marble busts were set;And on the wall frail Lais wrote her name. […]

I heard a strain of music in the street –A wandering waif of sound. And then straightwayA nameless desolation filled the day.The great green earth that had been fair and sweet,Seemed but a tomb; the life I thought repleteWith joy, grew lonely for a vanished May.Forgotten sorrows resurrected layLike bleaching skeletons about my feet. Above […]

The time has come when men with hearts and brainsMust rise and take the misdirected reinsOf government; too long left in the handsOf aliens and of lackeys. He who standsAnd sees the mighty vehicle of StateHauled through the mire to some ignoble fateAnd makes not such bold protest as he can,Is no American,

We two in the fever and fervour and glowOf life’s high tide have rejoiced together;We have looked out over the glittering snow,And known we were dwelling in Summer weather,For the seasons are made by the heart I hold,And not by outdoor heat or cold. We two, in the shadows of pain and woe,Have journeyed together […]

Lost rays of light that wandered off aloneAnd down through space were hurledFrom that great sapphire sun beyond our ownPale, puny little world.

A baby went to heaven while it slept,And, waking, missed its mother’s arms, and wept.Those angel tear-drops, falling earthward throughGod’s azure skies, into the turquoise grew.

A rose in my garden, the sweetest and fairest,Was hanging her head through the long golden hours;And early one morning I saw her tears falling,And heard a low gossiping talk in the bowers. The yellow Nasturtium, a spinster all faded,Was telling a Lily what ailed the poor Rose:‘That wild, roving Bee, who was hanging about […]

The tears of fallen women turned to iceBy man’s cold pity for repentant vice.

I We cannot choose our sorrows. One there wasWho, reverent of soul, and strong with trust,Cried, ‘God, though Thou shouldst bow me to the dust,Yet will I praise thy everlasting laws.Beggared, my faith would never halt or pause,But sing Thy glory, feasting on a crust.Only one boon, one precious boon I mustDemand of Thee, O […]

I list your prattle, baby boy,And hear your pattering feetWith feelings more of pain than joyAnd thoughts of bitter-sweet. While touching your soft hands in playSuch passionate longings riseFor my wee boy who strayed awaySo soon to Paradise. You win me with your infant art;But when our play is o’er,The empty cradle in my heartSeems […]

Sir Knight of the world’s oldest order,Sir Knight of the Army of God,You have crossed the strange mystical border,The ground-floor of truth you have trod;You stand on the typical thresholdWhich leads to the temple above;Where you come as a stone, and a Christ-chosen one,In the Kingdom of Friendship and Love. As you stand in this […]

In England there are wrongs, no doubt,Which should be righted; so men say,Who seek to weed earth’s garden outAnd give the roses right of way.Yes, right of way to fruit and rose,Where now but poison ivy grows. In England there is wide unrestThey tell me, who should know. And yetI saw but hedges gaily dressed,And […]

I Who has not felt his heart leap up, and glowWhat time the Tulips first begin to blow,Has one sweet joy still left for him to know. It is like early love’s imagining,That fragile pleasure which the Tulips bring,When suddenly we see them, in the Spring. Not all the garden’s later royal train,Not great triumphant […]