An eye where love with laughter tw… And songs on kisses still insisten… Blended with graying hair and wrin… To you, my child, seem inconsisten… In fact, you think such conduct sh…

I’m writing comedy again, The daintiest pleasure known to me… Unless a daintier might be To watch your acted comedy: The airy ladies gaily dressed,

My life is governed by the clock, All duly mapped and plotted; And only with a nervous shock I miss the time allotted. My course without has always been

When I was little, My life was half fear. My nerves were as brittle As nature may bear. Shapes monstrous would follow

The huge old earth shook and quive… When it heard my passionate cry. Why, even the little stars shivere… And almost went out in the sky. But the earth and the stars knew b…

O Robert Lee, you paladin, I wonder how my words would strike… I know the portrait might have bee… In many, many ways more like you. But you would not have had me plan

Of old our father’s God was real, Something they almost saw, Which kept them to a stern ideal And scourged them into awe. They walked the narrow path of rig…

The idle wind blows all the day. I wish it blew my care away. The idle wind blows all day long And weaves a burden to my song Upon the melancholy flight

Sing a little, play a little, Laugh a little; for Life is so extremely brittle, Who would think of more? Every long-laid project shatters,

A bit of metaphysics or a psycholo… Will sit upon my breast all day an… scratch. Now isn’t it a pity that… I really have no liking for abstru… I prefer to laugh in sunshine and…

Who cares, Though age oppress, And griefs distress, And the long, long day Rolls slow away

Just to utter a word, That is all I desire; That may still be heard, When I expire; That still may glow,

Silly little bird, Singing of its love, Sang and never heard Winds of wrath above. Winds of wrath came down,

Down come the leaves, Like fleeting years, Or idle tears Of love that grieves. A tinkling trill,

The ghost of night’s long hours de… In congregation dreary, And leave my sorrow-trampled heart Intolerably weary. But Chirpings bright in dewy wood…