Black Beetles in Amber

As it never did before!
While an inch of it remains
He will noted be for brains,
And at last ('twill so befall)
Fit to cease to write at all.

THE FYGHTYNGE SEVENTH

It is the gallant Seventh—
  It fyghteth faste and free!
God wot the where it fyghteth
  I ne desyre to be.
The Gonfalon it flyeth,
  Seeming a Flayme in Sky;
The Bugel loud yblowen is,
  Which sayeth, Doe and dye!
And (O good Saints defende us
  Agaynst the Woes of Warr)
Drawn Tongues are flashing deadly
  To smyte the Foeman sore!
With divers kinds of Riddance
  The smoaking Earth is wet,
And all aflowe to seaward goe
  The Torrents wide of Sweat!
The Thunder of the Captens,
  And eke the Shouting, mayketh
Such horrid Din the Soule within
  The boddy of me quayketh!
Who fyghteth the bold Seventh?
  What haughty Power defyes?
Their Colonel 'tis they drubben sore,
  And dammen too his Eyes!

INDICTED

Dear Bruner, once we had a little talk
  (That is to say, 'twas I did all the talking)
About the manner of your moral walk:
  How devious the trail you made in stalking,
On level ground, your law-protected game—
'Another's Dollar' is, I think, its name.
Your crooked course more recently is not
  So blamable; for, truly, you have stumbled
On evil days; and 'tis your luckless lot
  To traverse spaces (with a spirit humbled,
Contrite, dejected and divinely sad)
Where, 'tis confessed, the walking's rather bad.
Jordan, the song says, is a road (I thought
  It was a river) that is hard to travel;
And Dublin, if you'd find it, must be sought
  Along a highway with more rocks than gravel.
In difficulty neither can compete
With that wherein you navigate your feet.
As once George Gorham said of Pixley, so
  I say of you: 'The prison yawns before you,
The turnkey stalks behind!' Now will you go?
  Or lag, and let that functionary floor you?
To change the metaphor—you seem to be
Between Judge Wallace and the deep, deep sea!

OVER THE BORDER

O, justice, you have fled, to dwell
  In Mexico, unstrangled,
Lest you should hang as high as—well,
    As Haman dangled.
(I know not if his cord he twanged,
  Or the King proved forgiving.
'Tis hard to think of Haman hanged,
    And Haymond living.)
Yes, as I said: in mortal fear
  To Mexico you journeyed;
For you were on your trial here,
    And ill attorneyed.
The Law had long regarded you
  As an extreme offender.
Religion looked upon you, too,
    With thoughts untender.
The Press to you was cold as snow,
  For sin you'd always call so.
In Politics you were de trop,