And they will differ, if they do,
As syllable from sound.
XLIV.
The bone that has no marrow;
What ultimate for that?
It is not fit for table,
For beggar, or for cat.
A bone has obligations,
A being has the same;
A marrowless assembly
Is culpabler than shame.
But how shall finished creatures
A function fresh obtain? —
Old Nicodemus' phantom
Confronting us again!
XLV.
THE PAST.
The past is such a curious creature,
To look her in the face
A transport may reward us,
Or a disgrace.
Unarmed if any meet her,
I charge him, fly!
Her rusty ammunition
Might yet reply!
XLVI.
To help our bleaker parts
Salubrious hours are given,
Which if they do not fit for earth
Drill silently for heaven.
XLVII.
What soft, cherubic creatures
These gentlewomen are!
One would as soon assault a plush
Or violate a star.
Such dimity convictions,
A horror so refined
Of freckled human nature,
Of Deity ashamed, —
It's such a common glory,
A fisherman's degree!
Redemption, brittle lady,
Be so, ashamed of thee.
XLVIII.
DESIRE.
Who never wanted, — maddest joy
Remains to him unknown:
The banquet of abstemiousness
Surpasses that of wine.
Within its hope, though yet ungrasped
Desire's perfect goal,
No nearer, lest reality
Should disenthrall thy soul.
XLIX.
PHILOSOPHY.
It might be easier
To fail with land in sight,
Than gain my blue peninsula
To perish of delight.
L.
POWER.
You cannot put a fire out;
A thing that can ignite
Can go, itself, without a fan
Upon the slowest night.
You cannot fold a flood
And put it in a drawer, —
Because the winds would find it out,
And tell your cedar floor.
LI.
A modest lot, a fame petite,
A brief campaign of sting and sweet
Is plenty! Is enough!
A sailor's business is the shore,
A soldier's — balls. Who asketh more
Must seek the neighboring life!
LII.
Is bliss, then, such abyss
I must not put my foot amiss
For fear I spoil my shoe?
I'd rather suit my foot
Than save my boot,
For yet to buy another pair
Is possible
At any fair.
But bliss is sold just once;
The patent lost
None buy it any more.
LIII.
EXPERIENCE.
I stepped from plank to plank
So slow and cautiously;
The stars about my head I felt,
About my feet the sea.
I knew not but the next
Would be my final inch, —
This gave me that precarious gait
Some call experience.
LIV.
THANKSGIVING DAY.
One day is there of the series
Termed Thanksgiving day,
Celebrated part at table,
Part in memory.
Neither patriarch nor pussy,
I dissect the play;
Seems it, to my hooded thinking,
Reflex holiday.
Had there been no sharp subtraction
From the early sum,
Not an acre or a caption
Where was once a room,
Not a mention, whose small pebble
Wrinkled any bay, —
Unto such, were such assembly,
'T were Thanksgiving day.
LV.
CHILDISH GRIEFS.
Softened by Time's consummate plush,
How sleek the woe appears
That threatened childhood's citadel
And undermined the years!
Bisected now by bleaker griefs,
We envy the despair
That devastated childhood's realm,
So easy to repair.
II. LOVE.
I.
CONSECRATION.
Proud of my broken heart since thou didst break it,
Proud of the pain I did not feel till thee,
Proud of my night since thou with moons dost slake it,
Not to partake thy passion, my humility.
II.
LOVE'S HUMILITY.
My worthiness is all my doubt,
His merit all my fear,
Contrasting which, my qualities
Do lowlier appear;
Lest I should insufficient prove
For his beloved need,
The chiefest apprehension
Within my loving creed.
So I, the undivine abode
Of his elect content,
Conform my soul as 't were a church
Unto her sacrament.
III.
LOVE.
Love is anterior to life,
Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
The exponent of breath.
IV.
SATISFIED.
One blessing had I, than the rest
So larger to my eyes
That I stopped gauging, satisfied,
For this enchanted size.
It was the limit of my dream,
The focus of my prayer, —
A perfect, paralyzing bliss
Contented as despair.
I knew no more of want or cold,
Phantasms both become,
For this new value in the soul,
Supremest earthly sum.
The heaven below the heaven above
Obscured with ruddier hue.
Life's latitude leant over-full;
The judgment perished, too.
Why joys so scantily disburse,
Why Paradise defer,
Why floods are served to us in bowls, —
I speculate no more.
V.
WITH A FLOWER.
When roses cease to bloom, dear,
And violets are done,
When bumble-bees in solemn flight
Have passed beyond the sun,
The hand that paused to gather
Upon this summer's day
Will idle lie, in Auburn, —
Then take my flower, pray!
VI.
SONG.
Summer for thee grant I may be
When summer days are flown!
Thy music still when whippoorwill
And oriole are done!
For thee to bloom, I'll skip the tomb
And sow my blossoms o'er!
Pray gather me, Anemone,
Thy flower forevermore!
VII.
LOYALTY.
Split the lark and you'll find the music,
Bulb after bulb, in silver rolled,