Friendship

I should not dare to leave my friend

205

I should not dare to leave my friend,
Because-because if he should die
While I was gone-and I-too late-
Should reach the Heart that wanted me-

If I should disappoint the eyes
That hunted-hunted so-to see-
And could not bear to shut until
They "noticed" me-they noticed me-

If I should stab the patient faith
So sure I'd come-so sure I'd come-
It listening-listening-went to sleep-
Telling my tardy name-

My Heart would wish it broke before-
Since breaking then-since breaking then-
Were useless as next morning's sun-
Where midnight frosts-had lain!

Elysium is as far as to

Elysium is as far as to
The very nearest Room
If in that Room a Friend await
Felicity or Doom--

What fortitude the Soul contains
That it can so endure
The accent of a coming Foot--
The opening of a Door--

Conscious am I in my Chamber

679

Conscious am I in my Chamber,
Of a shapeless friend-
He doth not attest by Posture-
Nor Confirm-by Word-

Neither Place-need I present Him-
Fitter Courtesy
Hospitable intuition
Of His Company


Presence-is His furthest license-
Neither He to Me
Nor Myself to Him-by Accent-
Forfeit Probity-

Weariness of Him, were quainter
Than Monotony
Knew a Particle-of Space's
Vast Society

Neither if He visit Other-
Do He dwell-or Nay-know I-
But Instinct esteem Him
Immortality-

Worthy The Name of Sir Knight

I

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 have entered the sanctum sanctorum,
Which leads to the temple above,
Where you come as a stone, and a Christ-chosen one,
In the kingdom of Friendship and Love.


II


As you stand in this new realm of beauty,
Where each man you meet is your friend,
Think not that your promise of duty
In hall, or asylum, shall end;
Outside, in the great world of pleasure,
Beyond, in the clamor of trade,
In the battle of life and its coarse daily strife
Remember the vows you have made.


III


Your service, majestic and solemn,
Your symbols, suggestive and sweet,
Your uniformed phalanx in column
On gala days marching the street;
Your sword and your plume and your helmet,
Your 'secrets' hid from the world's sight;
These things are the small, lesser parts of the all
Which are needed to form the true Knight.


IV


The martyrs who perished rejoicing
In Templary's glorious laws,
Who died 'midst the fagots while voicing
The glory and worth of their cause-
They honored the title of 'Templar'
No more than the Knight of to-day
Who mars not the name with one blemish of shame,
But carries it clean through life's fray.


V


To live for a cause, to endeavor
To make your deeds grace it, to try
And uphold its precepts forever,
Is harder by far than to die.
For the battle of life is unending,
The enemy, Self, never tires,



And the true Knight must slay that sly foe every day
Ere he reaches the heights he desires.


VI


Sir Knight, have you pondered the meaning
Of all you have heard and been told?
Have you strengthened your heart for its weaning
From vices and faults loved of old?
Will you honor, in hours of temptation,
Your promises noble and grand?
Will your spirit be strong to do battle with wrong,
'And having done all, to stand?'


VII


Will you ever be true to a brother
In actions as well as in creed?
Will you stand by his side as no other
Could stand in the hour of his need?
Will you boldly defend him from peril,
And lift him from poverty's curse-
Will the promise of aid which you willingly made,
Reach down from your lips to your purse?


VIII


The world's battle field is before you!
Let Wisdom walk close by your side,
Let Faith spread her snowy wings o'er you,
Let Truth be your comrade and guide;
Let Fortitude, Justice and Mercy
Direct all your conduct aright,
And let each word and act tell to men the proud fact,
You are worthy the name of 'Sir Knight'.

Woman To Man

You do but jest, sir, and you jest not well,
How could the hand be enemy of the arm,
Or seed and sod be rivals! How could light
Feel jealousy of heat, plant of the leaf
Or competition dwell 'twixt lip and smile?
Are we not part and parcel of yourselves?
Like strands in one great braid we intertwine
And make the perfect whole. You could not be,
Unless we gave you birth; we are the soil
From which you sprang, yet sterile were that soil
Save as you planted. (Though in the Book we read
One woman bore a child with no man's aid
We find no record of a man-child born
Without the aid of woman! Fatherhood
Is but a small achievement at the best
While motherhood comprises heaven and hell.)
This ever-growing argument of sex
Is most unseemly, and devoid of sense.
Why waste more time in controversy, when
There is not time enough for all of love,
Our rightful occupation in this life.
Why prate of our defects, of where we fail
When just the story of our worth would need
Eternity for telling, and our best
Development comes ever thro' your praise,
As through our praise you reach your highest self.
Oh! had you not been miser of your praise
And let our virtues be their own reward
The old established, order of the world
Would never have been changed. Small blame is ours
For this unsexing of ourselves, and worse
Effeminizing of the male. We were
Content, sir, till you starved us, heart and brain.
All we have done, or wise, or otherwise
Traced to the root, was done for love of you.
Let us taboo all vain comparisons,
And go forth as God meant us, hand in hand,
Companions, mates and comrades evermore;
Two parts of one divinely ordained whole.

The Traveller

Reply to Rudyard Kipling’s ‘He travels the fastest who travels alone.’

Who travels alone with his eye on the heights,
Though he laughs in the day time oft weeps on the nights;
For courage goes down at the set of the sun,


When the toil of the journey is all borne by one.


He speeds but to grief though full gaily he ride
Who travels alone without love at his side.
Who travels alone without lover of friend


But hurries from nothing, to naught at the end.


Though great be his winnings and high be his goal,
He is bankrupt in wisdom and beggared in soul.
Life’s one gift of value to him is denied


Who travels alone without love at his side.


It is easy enough in this world to make haste
If one live for that purpose – but think of the waste;
For life is a poem to leisurely read,


And the joy of the journey lies not in its speed.


Oh! vain his achievement and petty his pride
Who travels alone without love at his side.

The Land Of The Gone-Away Souls

Oh! that is a beautiful land, I wis,
The land of the Gone-away Souls.
Yes, a lovelier region by far than this
(Though this is a world most fair).
The goodliest goal of all good goals,
Else why do our friends stay there?


I walk in a world that is sweet with friends,
And earth I have ever held dear;
Yes, love with duty and beauty blends
To render the earth-place bright.
But faster and faster, year on year,
My comrades hurry from sight.


They hurry away to the Over-There,
And few of them say farewell;
Yes, they go away with a secret air
As if on a secret quest.
And they come not back to earth to tell
Why that land seems the best.


Messages come from the mystic sphere,
But few know the code of that land,
Yes, many the message but few who hear,
In the din of the world below,
Or hearing the message, can understand
Those truths which we long to know.


But it must be the goal of all good goals,
And I think of it more and more.
Yes, think of that land of the Gone-Away Souls
And its growing hosts of friends
Who will hail my bark when it touches shore
Where the last brief journey ends.

Songs Of A Country Home

I

Who has not felt his heart leap up, and glow
What time the tulips first begin to blow,
Has one sweet joy, still left for him to know.


It is like early loves' imagining;
That fragile pleasure, which the Tulips bring,
When suddenly we see them, in the Spring.


Not all the gardens later royal train,
Not great triumphant Roses, when they reign,
Can bring that delicate delight again.


II


One of the sweetest hours is this;
(Of all I think we like it best
A little restful oasis,
Between the breakfast, and the post.
Just south of coffee, and of toast,
Just north of daily task and duty;
Just west of dreams, this Island gleams,
A fertile spot of peace and beauty.


We wander out across the lawn;
We idle by a bush in bloom;
The Household pets come following on;
Or if the day is one of gloom,
We loiter in a pleasant room
Or from a casement, lean and chatter.
Then comes the mail, like sudden hail,
And off we scatter.


III


When roses die, in languid August days,
We leave the Garden, to its fallen ways;
And seek the shelter of wide porticos,
Where Honeysuckle, in defiance blows
Undaunted by the Sun's too ardent rays.


The matron Summer, turns a wistful gaze
Across green valleys, back to tender Mays;
And something of her large contentment goes,
When roses die.


Yet all her subtle fascination stays
To lure us into idle sweet delays.
The lowered awning, by the hammock shows
Inviting nooks for dreaming and repose;
Oh, restful are the pleasures of those days



When roses die.

IV

The summer folk, fled back to town;
The green woods changed to red and brown;
A sound upon the frosty air
Of windows closing everywhere.


And then the log, lapped by a blaze.
Oh, what is better than these days;
With books and friends and love a-near;
Go on, gay world, but leave me here.

Sorrow's Uses

The uses of sorrow I comprehend
Better and better at each year’s end.


Deeper and deeper I seem to see
Why and wherefore it has to be


Only after the dark, wet days
Do we fully rejoice in the sun’s bright rays.


Sweeter the crust tastes after the fast
Than the sated gourmand’s finest repast.


The faintest cheer sounds never amiss
To the actor who once has heard a hiss.


To one who the sadness of freedom knows,
Light seem the fetters love may impose.


And he who has dwelt with his heart alone,
Hears all the music in friendship’s tone.


So better and better I comprehend,
How sorrow ever would be our friend.

Solitude


Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone.
For the sad old earth must borrow it's mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.
Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air.
The echoes bound to a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.


Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go.
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all.
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life's gall.


Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
Succeed and give, and it helps you live,
But no man can help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a long and lordly train,
But one by one we must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.

Refuted


‘Anticipation is sweeter than realisation.’

It may be, yet I have not found it so.
In those first golden dreams of future fame
I did not find such happiness as came

When toil was crowned with triumph. Now I know

My words have recognition, and will go
Straight to some listening heart, my early aim,
To win the idle glory of a name,

Pales like a candle in the noonday’s glow.

So with the deeper joys of which I dreamed:
Life yields more rapture than did childhood’s fancies,
And each year brings more pleasure than I waited.

Friendship proves truer than of old it seemed,
And, all beyond youth’s passion-hued romances,
Love is more perfect than anticipated.

My Friend

When first I looked upon the face of Pain
I shrank repelled, as one shrinks from a foe
Who stands with dagger poised, as for a blow.
I was in search of Pleasure and of Gain;
I turned aside to let him pass: in vain;
He looked straight in my eyes and would not go.
'Shake hands,' he said; 'our paths are one, and so
We must be comrades on the way, 'tis plain.'
I felt the firm clasp of his hand on mine;
Through all my veins it sent a strengthening glow.
I straightway linked my arm in his, and lo!
He led me forth to joys almost divine;
With God's great truths enriched me in the end:
And now I hold him as my dearest friend.

Memory's Mansion

In Memory's Mansion are wonderful rooms,
And I wander about them at will;
And I pause at the casements, where boxes of blooms
Are sending sweet scents o'er the sill.
I lean from a window that looks on a lawn;
From a turret that looks on the wave.
But I draw down the shade when I see on some glade
A stone standing guard by a grave.


To Memory's attic I clambered one day
When the roof was resounding with rain,
And there, among relics long hidden away,
I rummaged with heart ache and pain.
A hope long surrendered and covered with dust,
A pastime, out-grown and forgot,
And a fragment of love all corroded with rust,
Were lying heaped up in one spot.


And there on the floor of that garret was tossed
A friendship too fragile to last,
With pieces of dearly bought pleasures that cost
Vast fortunes of pain in the past,
A fabric of passion, once vivid and bright,
As the breast of a robin in Spring,
Was spread out before me-a terrible sight-
A moth-eaten rag of a thing.


Then down the deep stairway I hurriedly went,
And into fair chambers below;
But the mansion seemed filled with the old attic scent
Wherever my footsteps would go.
Though in Memory's House I still wander full oft,
No more to the garret I climb;
And I leave all the rubbish heaped there in the loft
To the hands of the Housekeeper, Time.

Leudeman's-on-the-River


Toward even when the day leans down,
To kiss the upturned face of night,
Out just beyond the loud-voiced town
I know a spot of calm delight.
Like crimson arrows from a quiver
The red rays pierce the water flowing,
While we go dreaming, singing, rowing,
To Leudeman's-on-the-River.


The hills, like some glad mocking-bird,
Send back our laughter and our singing,
While faint--and yet more faint is heard
The steeple bells all sweetly ringing.
Some message did the winds deliver
To each glad heart that August night,
All heard, but all heard not aright;
By Leudeman's-on-the-River.


Night falls as in some foreign clime,
Between the hills that slope and rise.
So dusk the shades at landing time,
We could not see each other's eyes.
We only saw the moonbeams quiver
Far down upon the stream! that night
The new moon gave but little light
By Leudeman's-on-the-River.


How dusky were those paths that led
Up from the river to the hall.
The tall trees branching overhead
Invite the early shades that fall.
In all the glad blithe world, oh, never
Were hearts more free from care than when
We wandered through those walks, we ten,
By Leudeman's-on-the-River.


So soon, so soon, the changes came.
This August day we two alone,
On that same river, not the same,
Dream of a night forever flown.
Strange distances have come to sever
The hearts that gayly beat in pleasure,
Long miles we cannot cross or measure--
From Leudeman's-on-the-River.


We'll pluck two leaves, dear friend, to-day.
The green, the russet! seems it strange
So soon, so soon, the leaves can change!
Ah, me! so runs all night away
This night wind chills me, and I shiver;
The summer time is almost past.
One more good-bye--perhaps the last



To Leudeman's-on-the-River.

In England

In England, there are wrongs no doubt,
Which should be righted; so men say,
Who seek to weed earth's garden out,
And 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 unrest,
They tell me who should know; and yet
I saw but hedges, gayly dressed,
And eyes where love and kindness met;
Yes, love and kindness, met and made
Soft sunshine even in the shade.


In England, there are haunting things
Which follow one to other lands;
Like some pervading scent that clings
To laces touched by vanished hands;
Yes, touched by vanished hands, which made
A fragrance that defies the grave.


In England, centuries of art
Give common things a mellow tone;
And wake old memories in the heart
Of other lives the soul has known;
Yes, other lives in some past age
Start forth from canvas, and from page.


In England, there are simple joys,
The modern world has left all sweet;
In London's heart, are nooks where noise
Has entered but with slippered feet;
Yes, entered softly. Friend, believe,
To part from England is to grieve.

If I Should Die

If I should die, how kind you all would grow!
In that strange hour I would not have one foe.
There are no words too beautiful to say
Of one who goes forevermore away
Across that ebbing tide which has no flow.
With what new lustre my good deeds would glow!
If faults were mine, no one would call them so,
Or speak of me in aught but praise that day,
If I should die.
Ah, friends! before my listening ear lies low,
While I can hear and understand, bestow
That gentle treatment and fond love, I pray,
The lustre of whose late though radiant way
Would gild my grave with mocking light, I know,
If I should die.

Greeting Poem

There was a sound in the wind to-day,
Like a joyous cymbal ringing!
And the leaves of the trees talked with the breeze,
And they altogether were singing,
For they knew that an army, both bold and strong,
A brave, brave army, was coming,
Not with the fife and sounds of strife,
With marshal music and drumming,
Not with stern faces and gleaming swords,
That would make blood to flow like water,
While brother and brother should slay each other
On wholesale fields of slaughter;
But rather like rills from a thousand hills,
That ripple through valley and heather,
On, on to the sea, with a song of glee,
Till they meet and mingle together.


They come from the South, and the East, and the West,
The bravest and best in the nation.
They come at no idle and aimless quest,
But to work for a world's salvation.
From the Scot's fair land and from England's strand,
O'er mountain and heather and ocean,
They come; and the foe by their coming shall know
The strength of a Templar's devotion.
On the earnest brows, in the thoughtful eyes,
We read the unchanging story-
They fight in their might for the truth and the right,
And not for vain name or glory.
O grandest of armies! O bravest of bands!
We give you a cordial greeting,
And the blood of our warm hearts beats in the hands
That are offered to you in meeting.
The heart of a Templar is never cold,
Nor stands it aloof from a brother,
And his hand is steady, and always ready
To clasp the hand of another.
In God's great Book, where but angels look,
On pages of spotless beauty
Are written in letters of living light
A Templar's vow and his duty.
'For ever and ever,' the promise reads,
For ever and ever 'twas given.
And who keeps or breaks the pledge that he takes
Must meet the record in heaven.


Our order is noble and grand and strong,
And is gathering strength each hour,
And the good of the earth proclaim its worth,
While the foe turns pale at its power.



And we of the State that men call great,
The nation's brave 'Badger' daughter,
Step by step as we go, are defeating the foe,
While we add to the hosts of cold water.


With a chief at our head whom the foe may well dread,
The Sherman or Grant of our battles,
By day and by night we fight the good fight,
Though never a cannon rattles.
For the tongue and the pen are the swords of our men,
And prayer keeps them whetted and polished;
They will let God's light in on the foe's licensed sin,
Till the traffic of death is abolished.


With cunning hands we fashioned the strands
Of a stout restraining tether,
To fasten the beast, for a season at least,
And our statesmen tied it together.
The beast strains the rope with the idle hope
Of making it weaker or longer,
But the Templars to-day are working away
To make it shorter and stronger.


We give you greeting-we need your aid!
There is work for many a morrow,
There are beautiful souls going down in the bowls,
There are homes that are burdened with sorrow,
There are mourning captives all over the earth,
Hugging the fetters that bind them.
We must show them the light, we must set them aright,
We must work for them all as we find them.


With a soaring 'Faith,' that is stronger than death,
We must work while the day hangs o'er us.
We are brave and strong, and our battle-song
Has 'Hope' for the ringing chorus.
With 'Charity' broad as the mercy of God,
We must lift up the fallen neighbor,
And the Lord's dear band, in the angel land,
Will smile on our blesséd labor.


Welcome, brave warriors in God's holy cause!
The hearts in our bosoms are beating
As one heart to-night, filled with pride and delight-
Welcome, thrice welcome, our greeting.
And though soon between will lie long miles of green,
Though oceans divide us for ever,



The ties which now bind heart with heart, mind with mind,
The hand of Death only can sever.

Friendship


Dear friend, I pray thee, if thou wouldst be proving
Thy strong regard for me,
Make me no vows. Lip-service is not loving;
Let thy faith speak for thee.


Swear not to me that nothing can divide us-
So little such oaths mean.
But when distrust and envy creep beside us
Let them not come between.


Say not to me the depths of thy devotion
Are deeper than the sea;
But watch, lest doubt or some unkind emotion
Embitter them for me.


Vow not to love me ever and for ever,
Words are such idle things;
But when we differ in opinions, never
Hurt me by little stings.


I'm sick of words: they are so lightly spoken,
And spoken, are but air.
I'd rather feel thy trust in me unbroken
Than list thy words so fair.


If all the little proofs of trust are heeded,
It thou are always kind,
No sacrifice, no promise will be needed
To satisfy my mind.

American Boys, Hello!

Oh! we love all the French, and we speak in French
As along through France we go.
But the moments to us that are keen and sweet
Are the ones when our khaki boys we meet,
Stalwart and handsome and trim and neat;
And we call to them-'Boys, hello!'
'Hello, American boys,
Luck to you, and life's best joys!
American boys, hello!'


We couldn't do that if we were at home-
It never would do you know!
For there you must wait till you're told who's who,
And to meet in the way that nice folks do.
Though you knew his name, and your name he knew-
You never would say 'Hello, hello, American boy!'
But here it's just a joy,
As we pass along in the stranger throng,
To call out, 'Boys, hello!'


For each is a brother away from home;
And this we are sure is so,
There's a lonesome spot in his heart somewhere,
And we want him to feel there are friends
right there


In this foreign land, and so we dare
To call out 'Boys, hello!'
'Hello, American boys,
Luck to you, and life's best joys!
American boys, hello!'

The Shampoo

The still explosions on the rocks,
the lichens, grow
by spreading, gray, concentric shocks.
They have arranged
to meet the rings around the moon, although
within our memories they have not changed.


And since the heavens will attend
as long on us,
you've been, dear friend,
precipitate and pragmatical;
and look what happens. For Time is
nothing if not amenable.


The shooting stars in your black hair
in bright formation
are flocking where,
so straight, so soon?
--Come, let me wash it in this big tin basin,
battered and shiny like the moon.

To Flush, My Dog

Loving friend, the gift of one
Who her own true faith has run

Through thy lower nature,
Be my benediction said
With my hand upon thy head,

Gentle fellow-creature!

Like a lady's ringlets brown,
Flow thy silken ears adown

Either side demurely
Of thy silver-suited breast
Shining out from all the rest

Of thy body purely.

Darkly brown thy body is,
Till the sunshine striking this

Alchemise its dullness,
When the sleek curls manifold
Flash all over into gold

With a burnished fulness.

Underneath my stroking hand,
Startled eyes of hazel bland

Kindling, growing larger,
Up thou leapest with a spring,
Full of prank and curveting,

Leaping like a charger.

Leap! thy broad tail waves a light,
Leap! thy slender feet are bright,

Canopied in fringes;
Leap! those tasselled ears of thine
Flicker strangely, fair and fine

Down their golden inches

Yet, my pretty, sportive friend,
Little is't to such an end

That I praise thy rareness;
Other dogs may be thy peers
Haply in these drooping ears

And this glossy fairness.

But of thee it shall be said,
This dog watched beside a bed

Day and night unweary,
Watched within a curtained room
Where no sunbeam brake the gloom

Round the sick and dreary.

Roses, gathered for a vase,
In that chamber died apace,

Beam and breeze resigning;


This dog only, waited on,
Knowing that when light is gone

Love remains for shining.

Other dogs in thymy dew
Tracked the hares and followed through

Sunny moor or meadow;
This dog only, crept and crept
Next a languid cheek that slept,

Sharing in the shadow.

Other dogs of loyal cheer
Bounded at the whistle clear,

Up the woodside hieing;
This dog only, watched in reach
Of a faintly uttered speech

Or a louder sighing.

And if one or two quick tears
Dropped upon his glossy ears

Or a sigh came double,
Up he sprang in eager haste,
Fawning, fondling, breathing fast,

In a tender trouble.

And this dog was satisfied
If a pale thin hand would glide

Down his dewlaps sloping, --
Which he pushed his nose within,
After, -- platforming his chin

On the palm left open.

This dog, if a friendly voice
Call him now to blither choice

Than such chamber-keeping,
'Come out!' praying from the door, --
Presseth backward as before,

Up against me leaping.

Therefore to this dog will I,
Tenderly not scornfully,

Render praise and favor:
With my hand upon his head,
Is my benediction said

Therefore and for ever.

And because he loves me so,
Better than his kind will do

Often man or woman,
Give I back more love again
Than dogs often take of men,

Leaning from my Human.


Blessings on thee, dog of mine,
Pretty collars make thee fine,

Sugared milk make fat thee!
Pleasures wag on in thy tail,
Hands of gentle motion fail

Nevermore, to pat thee

Downy pillow take thy head,
Silken coverlid bestead,

Sunshine help thy sleeping!
No fly's buzzing wake thee up,
No man break thy purple cup

Set for drinking deep in.

Whiskered cats arointed flee,
Sturdy stoppers keep from thee

Cologne distillations;
Nuts lie in thy path for stones,
And thy feast-day macaroons

Turn to daily rations!

Mock I thee, in wishing weal? --
Tears are in my eyes to feel

Thou art made so straitly,
Blessing needs must straiten too, --
Little canst thou joy or do,

Thou who lovest greatly.

Yet be blessed to the height
Of all good and all delight

Pervious to thy nature;
Only loved beyond that line,
With a love that answers thine,

Loving fellow-creature!

Sonnet II

But only three in all God's universe
Have heard this word thou hast said,--Himself, beside
Thee speaking, and me listening ! and replied
One of us . . . that was God, . . . and laid the curse
So darkly on my eyelids, as to amerce
My sight from seeing thee,--that if I had died,
The deathweights, placed there, would have signified
Less absolute exclusion. 'Nay' is worse
From God than from all others, O my friend !
Men could not part us with their worldly jars,
Nor the seas change us, nor the tempests bend;
Our hands would touch for all the mountain-bars:
And, heaven being rolled between us at the end,
We should but vow the faster for the stars.

Sonnet 02 - But only three in all God's universe

II

But only three in all God's universe
Have heard this word thou hast said,-Himself, beside
Thee speaking, and me listening! and replied
One of us . . . that was God, . . . and laid the curse
So darkly on my eyelids, as to amerce
My sight from seeing thee,-that if I had died,
The deathweights, placed there, would have signified
Less absolute exclusion. 'Nay' is worse
From God than from all others, O my friend!
Men could not part us with their worldly jars,
Nor the seas change us, nor the tempests bend;
Our hands would touch for all the mountain-bars:
And, heaven being rolled between us at the end,
We should but vow the faster for the stars.

The Duck and the Kangaroo

Said the Duck to the Kangaroo,
'Good gracious! how you hop!
Over the fields and the water too,
As if you never would stop!
My life is a bore in this nasty pond,
And I long to go out in the world beyond!
I wish I could hop like you!'
Said the Duck to the Kangaroo.


'Please give me a ride on your back!'
Said the Duck to the Kangaroo.
'I would sit quite still, and say nothing but 'Quack',
The whole of the long day through!
And we'd go to the Dee, and the Jelly Bo Lee,
Over the land, and over the sea;
Please take me a ride! O do!'
Said the Duck to the Kangaroo.


Said the Kangaroo to the Duck,
'This requires some little reflection;
Perhaps on the whole it might bring me luck,
And there seems but one objection,
Which is, if you'll let me speak so bold,
Your feet are unpleasantly wet and cold,
And would probably give me the roo-
Matiz!' said the Kangaroo.


Said the Duck, 'As I sat on the rocks,
I have thought over that completely,
And I bought four pairs of worsted socks
Which fit my web-feet neatly.
And to keep out the cold I've bought a cloak,
And every day a cigar I'll smoke,
All to follow my own dear true
Love of a Kangaroo!'


Said the Kangaroo, 'I'm ready!
'All in the moonlight pale;
'But to balance me well, dear Duck, sit steady!
'And quite at the end of my tail!'
So away they went with a hop and a bound,
And they hopped the whole world three times round;
And who so happy - O who,
As the Duck and the Kangaroo?