Brave brief hopes, are you not sped as the wave— Sped to a requiem sighed on a wreck-strewn shore? While memory murmurs in dreams that you once were brave, And sadness softly sighs that you are no more.
ECHOES
By the way of blowing roses, in the laughter-laden years, Happy lads and lightsome lasses tripped the song-sweet lanes with me; Gladness woke the hillside echoes in the sound of ringing cheers, Rapture rippled on the breezes sweeping from the rippled sea.
Happy lads have left the hillside for a bourne beyond the bay, Lightsome lasses know not laughter hid beneath enduring stone; Echoes of a strangled sorrow in the sea mist far away, Haunt the lanes where song is silent and the roses all are blown.
A BALLADE OF CORNWALL
Westward where the latest sunbeam lingers on the brow of night, Lies a land of old romance enshrined in amethystine sea, Where from cairn and cromlech come, to eyes illumed by subtle sight, Fays and pixies, sprites and gnomes, in pomp of faery pageantry. Shining forms of ghostly knights, and dream-like dames of chivalry Gleam among the gorse and furze, and pace the reedy valleys low, Moving through a magic mist amid the days of long ago— Knights and ladies living still in trusted legendary lore Lilt their lovelorn lays or speed their clamorous challenge to the foe In the land where ceaseless surges smite the crag-crowned rock-strewn shore.