* * * * *

THE CATHEDRAL SPIRE

It soars like hearts of hapless men who dare
  To sue for gifts the gods refuse to allot;
Who climb for ever toward they know not where,
  Baffled for ever by they know not what.

* * * * *

AN EPITAPH

His friends he loved.  His fellest earthly foes—­
  Cats—­I believe he did but feign to hate. 
My hand will miss the insinuated nose,
  Mine eyes the tail that wagg’d contempt at Fate.

* * * * *

THE METROPOLITAN UNDERGROUND RAILWAY

Here were a goodly place wherein to die;—­
  Grown latterly to sudden change averse,
All violent contrasts fain avoid would I
  On passing from this world into a worse.

* * * * *

TO A SEABIRD

Fain would I have thee barter fates with me,—­
Lone loiterer where the shells like jewels be,
Hung on the fringe and frayed hem of the sea. 
But no,—­’twere cruel, wild-wing’d Bliss! to thee.

* * * * *

ON DUeRER’S MELENCOLIA

What holds her fixed far eyes nor lets them range? 
Not the strange sea, strange earth, or heav’n more strange;
But her own phantom dwarfing these great three,
More strange than all, more old than heav’n, earth, sea.

* * * * *

TANTALUS

He wooes for ever, with foil’d lips of drouth, The wave that wearies not to mock his mouth.  ’Tis Lethe’s; they alone that tide have quaff’d Who never thirsted for the oblivious draught.

* * * * *

A MAIDEN’S EPITAPH

She dwelt among us till the flowers, ’tis said,
  Grew jealous of her:  with precipitate feet,
As loth to wrong them unawares, she fled. 
  Earth is less fragrant now, and heaven more sweet.

WORDSWORTH’S GRAVE

TO JAMES BROMLEY

WITH “WORDSWORTH’S GRAVE”

Ere vandal lords with lust of gold accurst
  Deface each hallowed hillside we revere—­
Ere cities in their million-throated thirst
  Menace each sacred mere—­
Let us give thanks because one nook hath been
  Unflooded yet by desecration’s wave,
The little churchyard in the valley green
  That holds our Wordsworth’s grave.

’Twas there I plucked these elegiac blooms,
  There where he rests ’mid comrades fit and few,
And thence I bring this growth of classic tombs,
  An offering, friend, to you—­
You who have loved like me his simple themes,
  Loved his sincere large accent nobly plain,
And loved the land whose mountains and whose streams
  Are lovelier for his strain.