condemnation;
All receive an invitation.
Death and Nature now are quaking,
And the late lamented, waking,
In their breezy shrouds are shaking.
Lo! the Ledger’s leaves are stirring,
And the Clerk, to them referring,
Makes it awkward for the erring.
When the Judge appears in session,
We shall all attend confession,
Loudly preaching non-suppression.
How shall I then make romances
Mitigating circumstances?
Even the just must take their chances.
King whose majesty amazes,
Save thou him who sings thy praises;
Fountain, quench my private blazes.
Pray remember, sacred Savior,
Mine the playful hand that gave your
Death-blow. Pardon such behavior.
Seeking me, fatigue assailed thee,
Calvary’s outlook naught availed thee;
Now ’twere cruel if I failed thee.
Righteous judge and learnèd brother,
Pray thy prejudices smother
Ere we meet to try each other.
Sighs of guilt my conscience gushes,
And my face vermilion flushes;
Spare me for my pretty blushes.
Thief and harlot, when repenting,
Thou forgavest—complimenting
Me with sign of like relenting.
If too bold is my petition
I’ll receive with due submission
My dismissal—from perdition.
When thy sheep thou hast selected
From the goats, may I, respected,
Stand amongst them undetected.
When offenders are indicted,
And with trial-flames ignited,
Elsewhere I’ll attend if cited.
Ashen-hearted, prone, and prayerful,
When of death I see the air full,
Lest I perish too, be careful.
On that day of lamentation,
When, to enjoy the conflagration,
Men come forth, O, be not cruel:
Spare me, Lord—make them thy fuel.
One Mood’s Expression
See, Lord, fanatics all arrayed
For revolution!
To foil their villainous crusade
Unsheathe again the sacred blade
Of persecution.
What though through long disuse ’tis grown
A trifle rusty?
’Gainst modern heresy, whose bone
Is rotten, and the flesh fly-blown,
It still is trusty.
Of sterner stuff thine ancient foes,
Unapprehensive,
Sprang forth to meet thy biting blows;
Our zealots chiefly to the nose
Assume the offensive.
Then wield the blade their necks to hack,
Nor ever spare one.
Thy crowns of martyrdom unpack,
But see that every martyr lack
The head to wear one.
Something in the Papers
“What’s in the paper?” Oh, it’s dev’lish dull:
There’s nothing happening at all—a lull
After the war-storm. Mr. Someone’s wife
Killed by her lover with, I think, a knife.
A fire on Blank Street and some babies—one,
Two, three or four, I don’t remember, done
To quite a delicate and lovely brown.
A husband shot by woman of the town—
The same old story. Shipwreck somewhere south.
The crew, all saved—or lost. Uncommon drouth
Makes hundreds homeless up the River Mud—
Though, come to think, I guess it was a flood.
’Tis feared some bank will burst—or else it won’t;
They always burst, I fancy—or they don’t;
Who cares a cent?—the banker pays his coin
And takes his chances: bullet in the groin—
But that’s another item. Suicide—
Fool lost his money (serve him right) and died.
Heigh-ho! there’s noth—Jerusalem! what’s this?
Tom Jones has failed! My God, what an abyss
Of ruin!—owes me seven hundred, clear!
Was ever such a damned disastrous year!
The Church’s compass, if you please,
Has two or three (or more) degrees
Of variation;
And many a soul has gone to grief
On this or that or t’other reef
Through faith unreckoning or brief
Miscalculation.
Misguidance is of perils chief
To navigation.
The obsequious thing makes, too, you’ll mark,
Obeisance through a little arc
Of declination;
For Satan, fearing witches, drew
From Death’s pale horse, one day, a shoe,
And nailed it to his door to undo
Their machination.
Since then the needle dips to woo
His habitation.
One President
“What are those, father?” “Statesmen, my child—
Lachrymose, unparliamentary, wild.”
“What are they that way for, father?” “Last fall,
‘Our candidate’s better,’ they said, ‘than all!’ ”
“What did they say he was, father?” “A man
Built on a straight and superior plan—
Believing that none for an office would do
Unless he were honest and capable too.”
“Poor gentlemen—so disappointed!” “Yes, lad,
That is the feeling that’s driving them mad;
They’re weeping and wailing and gnashing because
They find that he’s all that they said that he was.”
The Bride
“You know, my friends, with what a brave carouse
I made a second marriage in my house—
Divorced old barren Reason from my bed
And took the Daughter of the Vine to spouse.”
So sang the Lord of Poets. In a gleam
Of light that made her like an angel seem,
The Daughter of the Vine said: “I myself
Am Reason, and the Other was a Dream.”
The Man Born Blind
A man born blind received his sight
By a painful operation;
And these are things he saw in the light
Of an infant observation.
He saw a merchant, good and wise
And greatly, too, respected,
Who looked, to those imperfect eyes,
Like a swindler undetected.
He saw a patriot address
A noisy public meeting.
And said: “Why, that’s a calf. I guess,
That for the teat is bleating.”
A doctor stood beside a bed
And shook his summit sadly.
“O see that foul assassin!” said
The man who saw so badly.
He saw a lawyer pleading for
A thief whom they’d been jailing,
And said: “That’s an accomplice or
My sight again is failing.”
Upon the Bench a Justice sat,
With nothing to restrain him;
“ ’Tis strange,” said the observer, “that
They ventured to unchain him.”
With theologic works supplied,
He saw a solemn preacher;
“A burglar with his kit,” he cried,
“To rob a fellow creature.”
A bluff old farmer next he saw
Sell produce in a village,
And said: “What, what! is there no law
To punish men for pillage?”
A dame, tall, fair and stately, passed,
Who many charms united;
He thanked his stars his lot was cast
Where sepulchers were whited.
He saw a soldier stiff and stern,
“Full of strange oaths” and toddy,
But was unable to discern
A wound upon his body.
Ten square leagues of rolling ground
To one great man belonging,
Looked like one little grassy mound
With worms beneath it thronging.
A palace’s well-carven stones,
Where Dives dwelt contented,
Seemed built throughout of human bones
With human blood cemented.
He watched the shining yellow thread
A silk-worm was a-spinning;
“That creature’s coining gold,” he said,
“To pay some girl for sinning.”
His eyes were so untrained and dim
All politics, religions,
Arts, sciences, appeared to him
But modes of plucking pigeons.
And so he drew his final breath,
He thought he saw with sorrow
Some persons weeping for his death
Who’d be all smiles to-morrow.
A Nightmare
I
