INTRODUCTION

 Hear the voice of the Bard,
 Who present, past, and future, sees;
 Whose ears have heard
 The Holy Word
 That walked among the ancient tree;

 Calling the lapsed soul,
 And weeping in the evening dew;
 That might control
 The starry pole,
 And fallen, fallen light renew!

 “O Earth, O Earth, return! 
 Arise from out the dewy grass! 
 Night is worn,
 And the morn
 Rises from the slumbrous mass.

 “Turn away no more;
 Why wilt thou turn away? 
 The starry floor,
 The watery shore,
 Are given thee till the break of day.”

 Earth’s answer

 Earth raised up her head
 From the darkness dread and drear,
 Her light fled,
 Stony, dread,
 And her locks covered with grey despair.

 “Prisoned on watery shore,
 Starry jealousy does keep my den
 Cold and hoar;
 Weeping o’er,
 I hear the father of the ancient men.

 “Selfish father of men! 
 Cruel, jealous, selfish fear! 
 Can delight,
 Chained in night,
 The virgins of youth and morning bear?

 “Does spring hide its joy,
 When buds and blossoms grow? 
 Does the sower
 Sow by night,
 Or the plowman in darkness plough?

 “Break this heavy chain,
 That does freeze my bones around! 
 Selfish, vain,
 Eternal bane,
 That free love with bondage bound.”

 The clod and the pebble

 “Love seeketh not itself to please,
   Nor for itself hath any care,
 But for another gives it ease,
   And builds a heaven in hell’s despair.”

 So sang a little clod of clay,
   Trodden with the cattle’s feet,
 But a pebble of the brook
   Warbled out these metres meet: 

 “Love seeketh only Self to please,
   To bind another to its delight,
 Joys in another’s loss of ease,
   And builds a hell in heaven’s despite.”

 Holy Thursday

 Is this a holy thing to see
   In a rich and fruitful land, —­
 Babes reduced to misery,
   Fed with cold and usurous hand?

 Is that trembling cry a song? 
   Can it be a song of joy? 
 And so many children poor? 
   It is a land of poverty!

 And their son does never shine,
   And their fields are bleak and bare,
 And their ways are filled with thorns: 
   It is eternal winter there.

 For where’er the sun does shine,
   And where’er the rain does fall,
 Babes should never hunger there,
   Nor poverty the mind appall.

 The little girl lost

 In futurity
 I prophetic see
 That the earth from sleep
 (Grave the sentence deep)

Shall arise, and seek for her Maker meek; And the desert wild Become a garden mild.

 In the southern clime,
 Where the summer’s prime
 Never fades away,
 Lovely Lyca lay.