Poetry

what would you be at,
With torches, flags and bands?
You make me first throw up my hat,
And then my hands.

A Bequest to Music

“Let music flourish!” So he said and died.
Hark! when he’s gone the minstrelsy begins:
The symphonies ascend, a swelling tide,
Melodious thunders fill the welkin wide⁠—
The grand old lawyers, chinning on their chins!

Oneiromancy

I fell asleep and dreamed that I
Was flung, like Vulcan, from the sky;
Like him was lamed⁠—another part:
His leg was crippled, and my heart.
I woke in time to see my love
Conceal a letter in her glove.

July Fourth

God said: “Let there be noise.” The dawning fire
Of Independence gilded every spire.

A Paradox

“If life were not worth living,” said the preacher,
“ ’Twould have in suicide one pleasant feature.”
“An error,” said the pessimist, “you’re making:
What’s not worth having cannot be worth taking.”

Reedified

Lord of the tempest, pray refrain
From leveling this church again.
Now in its doom, since so you’ve willed it,
We acquiesce. But you’ll rebuild it.

A Bulletin

“Lothario is very low,”
So all the doctors tell.
Nay, nay, not so⁠—he will be, though,
If ever he get well.

An Inscription

For a Statue of Napoleon

A conqueror as provident as brave,
He robbed the cradle to supply the grave.
His reign laid quantities of human dust:
He fell upon the just and the unjust.

An Erroneous Assumption

Good for he’s old? Ah, Youth, you do not dream
How sweet the roses in the autumn seem!

A Constructor

I saw the devil. He was working free⁠—
A customs-house he builded by the sea.
“Why do you this?” The devil raised his head:
“Of churches I have built enough,” he said.

God Complies

“By prayer see Megapomp restored,”
Shouts Martext, pious creature.
Yes, God by supplication bored
From every droning preacher,
Exclaimed: “So be it, tiresome crew;
But I’ve a crow to pick with you.”

In Articulo Mortis

The paper presented he solemnly signed,
Gasping⁠—perhaps ’twas a jest he meant:
“This of a sound and disposing mind
Is the last illwill and contestament.”

The Discoverers

My! how my fame rings out in ever zone⁠—
A thousand critics shouting: “He’s unknown!”

Unexpounded

On Evidence, on Deeds, on Bills,
On Copyhold, on Loans, on Wills,
Lawyers great books indite.
The creaking of their busy quills
I never heard on Right.

The Eastern Question

Looking across the line, the Grecian said:
“This border I will stain a Turkey red.”
The Moslem smiled securely and replied:
“No Greek has ever for his country dyed.”
While thus each patriot guarded his frontier
The Powers stole all the country in his rear.

Two Types

Courageous fool!⁠—the peril’s strength unknown.
Courageous man!⁠—so conscious of your own.

To a Critic of Tennyson

Affronting fool, subdue your transient light;
When Wisdom’s dull dares Folly to be bright?
If Genius stumble in the path to fame
’Tis decency in dunces to go lame.

Cooperation

No more the swindler singly seeks his prey:
To hunt in couples is the modern way⁠—
A rascal, from the public to purloin,
An honest man to hide away the coin.

Humility

Great poets fire the world with fagots big
That make a crackling racket,
But I’m content with but a whispering twig
To warm some single jacket.

Strained Relations

Says England to Germany: “Africa’s ours.”
Says Germany: “Ours, I opine.”
Says Africa: “Tell me, delectable Powers,
What is it that ought to be mine?”

Exoneration

When men at candidacy don’t connive,
From that suspicion if their friends would free ’em,
The teeth and nails with which they do not strive
Should be exhibited in a museum.

After Portsmouth

Begirt with bombs that fall and flames that rise,
The Tsar, bewildered, stares. “Alas,” he cries,
“Life withholds joy and death denies release!
And Roosevelt would have me think this peace.”

A Voice from Peking

“ ‘Empress of China’! I nor rule nor reign:
I wear the purple but to hide the chain⁠—
Free only to hold back the open door
For foreign devils drunk upon my floor.”

A Pious Rite

On Maunday Thursday, as was good and meet,
The Emperor of Austria washed the feet
Of twelve poor men to show how humble he
For twenty minutes of the year could be.
O Thou, who trackest tenants of the throne
Through moral quagmires, make them wash their own.

Justice

She jilted me. I madly cried:
“The grave at least can hold her!”
Reflecting then that if she died
’Twould stop her growing older,
I pitilessly sheathed the knife
And sternly sentenced her to life!

At the Beach

List, England, to our words of scorn
For noblemen to title born!
Yet be thine eyes awhile depressed,
For one has turned his prow to-west,
And we, to catch his landing-line,
Are pickling all our shins in brine.

An Infraction of the Rules

A duel in France, and the victor pursued
By the dogs of the law, by the multitude,
By society’s fierce ill-will!
O what is the matter? The man was so rude,
That he made an attempt to kill!

Conversely

There’s grief in Belgrade, for no crown, it is said,
Is found for King Peter in all of the town.
How sad that he’s lacking a crown for his head!
How sweet were he lacking a head for his crown!

A Warning

Cried Age to Youth: “Abate your speed!⁠—
The distance hither’s brief indeed.”
But Youth pressed on without delay⁠—
The shout had reached but half the way.

Psychographs

Says Gerald Massey: “When I write, a band
Of souls of the departed guides my hand.”
How strange that poems cumbering our shelves,
Penned by immortal parts, have none themselves!

For Wounds

O bear me, gods, to some enchanted isle
Where woman’s tears can antidote her smile.

A Literary Method

His “Hoosier poems” Riley says he writes
Upon an empty stomach. Heavenly Powers,
Feed him throat-full: for what the wretch indites
Upon his empty stomach empties ours!

Back to Nature

Nathaniel, Julian, Hildegardy!
Sure the stock is far from hardy,
And the name once heard with awe
Now provokes the loud guffaw⁠—
“Hawthorne” in the memory dear,
“Haw-haw-hawthorne” in the ear!

Rudolph Block

What parallel, neighbor, be pleased to expound
’Twixt Belgium’s king and you