Room for earth’s sweetest out of doors,
And for its worst a tomb;
For housed-up griefs and fears, and scorns, and sighs,
No room—no room!
The Humming Bird
AGAINST my window-pane
He plunges at a mass
Of buds—and strikes in vain
The intervening glass.
O sprite of wings and fire
Outstretching eagerly,
My soul with like desire
To probe thy mystery,
Comes close as breast to bloom,
As bud to hot heart-beat,
And gains no inner room,
And drains no hidden sweet.
September
BUT yesterday all faint for breath,
The Summer laid her down to die;
And now her frail ghost wandereth
In every breeze that loiters by.
Her wilted prisoners look up,
As wondering who hath broke their chain,
Too deep they drank of summer’s cup,
They have no strength to rise again.
How swift the trees, their mistress gone,
Enrobe themselves for revelry!
Ungovernable winds upon
The wold are dancing merrily.
With crimson fruits and bursting nuts,
And whirling leaves and flushing streams,
The spirit of September cuts
Adrift from August’s languid dreams.