And so life's little work-day hour has all

Been spent and misspent doing what I could, And in regrets and efforts to recall

The chance of having, being, what I would.

And so sometimes I cannot choose but cry,
Seeing my late-sown flowers are hardly set-
O darkening color of the evening sky,
Spare me the day a little longer yet!

LAST AND BEST.

SOMETIMES, when rude, cold shadows run
Across whatever light I see ;
When all the work that I have done,
Or can do, seems but vanity;

I strive, nor vainly strive, to get
Some little heart's ease from the day

When all the weariness and fret
Shall vanish from my life away;

For I, with grandeur clothed upon,
Shall lie in state and take my rest,
And all my household, strangers grown,
Shall hold me for an honored guest.

But ere that day when all is set
In order, very still and grand,
And while my feet are lingering yet
Along this troubled border-land,

IN THE DARK.

What things will be the first to fade,
And down to utter darkness sink?
The treasures that my hands have laid
Where moth and rust corrupt, I think.

And Love will be the last to wait

And light my gloom with gracious gleams;
For Love lies nearer heaven's glad gate,
Than all imagination dreams.

Aye, when my soul its mask shall drop,
The twain to be no more at one,

Love, with its prayers, shall bear me up
Beyond the lark's wings, and the sun.

IN THE DARK.

HAS the Spring come back, my darling,
Has the long and soaking rain

Been moulded into the tender leaves

Of the gay and growing grain

The leaves so sweet of barley and wheat

All moulded out of the rain?

O, and I would I could see them grow,
O, and I would I could see them blow,
All over field and plain

The billows sweet of barley and wheat
All moulded out of the rain.

Are the flowers dressed out, my darling,
In their kerchiefs plain or bright-

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The groundwort gay, and the lady of May,
In her petticoat pink and white?

The fair little flowers, the rare little flowers,
Taking and making the light?

O, and I would I could see them all,
The little and low, the proud and tall,
In their kerchiefs brave and bright,
Stealing out of the morns and eves,
To braid embroidery round their leaves,
The gold and scarlet light.

Have the birds come back, my darling,
The birds from over the sea?

Are they cooing and courting together
In bush and bower and tree?

The mad little birds, the glad little birds,
The birds from over the sea!

O, and I would I could hear them sing,
O, and I would I could see them swing
In the top of our garden tree !

The mad little birds, the glad little birds,
The birds from over the sea!

Are they building their nests, my darling,
In the stubble, brittle and brown?

Are they gathering threads, and silken shreds,
And wisps of wool and down,

With their silver throats and speckled coats,

And eyes so bright and so brown?

O, and I would I could see them make

And line their nests for love's sweet sake,

With shreds of wool and down,

With their eyes so bright and brown!

AN INVALID'S PLEA.

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AN INVALID'S PLEA.

O SUMMER! my beautiful, beautiful Summer!
I look in thy face, and I long so to live;
But ah! hast thou room for an idle new-comer,
With all things to take, and with nothing to give?
With all things to take of thy dear loving-kindness,
The wine of thy sunshine, the dew of thy air;

And with nothing to give but the deafness and blind

ness

Begot in the depths of an utter despair?

As if the gay harvester meant but to screen her,
The black spider sits in her low loom, and weaves:

A lesson of trust to the tender-eyed gleaner

That bears in her brown arms the gold of the sheaves.

The blue-bird that trills her low lay in the bushes
Provokes from the robin a merrier glee;

The rose pays the sun for his kiss with her blushes,
And all things pay tithes to thee - all things but me!

At even, the fire-flies trim with their glimmers

The wild, weedy skirts of the field and the wood; At morning, those dear little yellow-winged swimmers, The butterflies, hasten to make their place good. The violet, alway so white and so saintly;

The cardinal, warming the frost with her blaze; The ant, keeping house at her sand-hearth so quaintly, Reproaches my idle and indolent ways.

When o'er the high east the red morning is breaking, And driving the amber of starlight behind,

The land of enchantment I leave, on awaking,

Is not so enchanted as that which I find.
And when the low west by the sunset is flattered,

And locust and katydid sing up their best,

Peace comes to my thoughts, that were used to be fluttered,

Like doves when an eagle's wing darkens their nest.

The green little grasshopper, weak as we deem her,
Chirps, day in and out, for the sweet right to live;
And canst thou, O Summer! make room for a dreamer,
With all things to take, and with nothing to give?
Room only to wrap her hot cheeks in thy shadows,
And all on thy daisy-fringed pillows to lie,
And dream of the gates of the glorious meadows,
Where never a rose of the roses shall die!

THE GREAT QUESTION.

"How are the dead raised up, and with what body do they come?"

THE waves, they are wildly heaving,

And bearing me out from the shore,
And I know of the things I am leaving,
But not of the things before.

O Lord of Love, whom the shape of a dove
Came down and hovered o'er,
Descend to-night with heavenly light,
And show me the farther shore.

There is midnight darkness o'er me,
And 'tis light, more light, I crave;