Shapes of Clay

TO ONE ACROSS THE WAY.

  When at your window radiant you've stood
    I've sometimes thought—forgive me if I've erred—
    That some slight thought of me perhaps has stirred
  Your heart to beat less gently than it should.
  I know you beautiful; that you are good
    I hope—or fear—I cannot choose the word,
    Nor rightly suit it to the thought. I've heard
  Reason at love's dictation never could.
  Blindly to this dilemma so I grope,
    As one whose every pathway has a snare:
      If you are minded in the saintly fashion
  Of your pure face my passion's without hope;
    If not, alas! I equally despair,
    For what to me were hope without the passion?

THE DEBTOR ABROAD.

  Grief for an absent lover, husband, friend,
  Is barely felt before it comes to end:
  A score of early consolations serve
  To modify its mouth's dejected curve.
  But woes of creditors when debtors flee
  Forever swell the separating sea.
  When standing on an alien shore you mark
  The steady course of some intrepid bark,
  How sweet to think a tear for you abides,
  Not all unuseful, in the wave she rides!—
  That sighs for you commingle in the gale
  Beneficently bellying her sail!

FORESIGHT.

  An 'actors' cemetery'! Sure
    The devil never tires
  Of planning places to procure
  The sticks to feed his fires.

A FAIR DIVISION.

  Another Irish landlord gone to grass,
  Slain by the bullets of the tenant class!
  Pray, good agrarians, what wrong requires
  Such foul redress? Between you and the squires
  All Ireland's parted with an even hand—
  For you have all the ire, they all the land.

GENESIS.

  God said: 'Let there be Man,' and from the clay
  Adam came forth and, thoughtful, walked away.
  The matrix whence his body was obtained,
  An empty, man-shaped cavity, remained
  All unregarded from that early time
  Till in a recent storm it filled with slime.
  Now Satan, envying the Master's power
  To make the meat himself could but devour,
  Strolled to the place and, standing by the pool,
  Exerted all his will to make a fool.
  A miracle!—from out that ancient hole
  Rose Morehouse, lacking nothing but a soul.
  'To give him that I've not the power divine,'
  Said Satan, sadly, 'but I'll lend him mine.'
  He breathed it into him, a vapor black,
  And to this day has never got it back.