In the lilac-blossom-time the lovers often fondly meet,
And drink the blossom’s odor, a true potency for dreams,
And oftest when the evening-dew makes it a tenfold sweet,
A-trembling like a tear of joy within the clear moonbeam,
The youth in his new happiness a prince of kingdoms is,
The maiden is a being fair, as from some other clime,
And heaven itself is upon earth in that pure, binding kiss,
There in her father’s garden in the lilac-blossom-time.

THE RUNNEL’S DITTY

I met a runnel amid the meads,
In the evening, in the evening,
And it did ramble ’mongst rush and reeds,
In the evening, in the evening,
And I did linger to hear its song,
As it did carelessly wind along,
In the evening, in the evening.

What sang the runnel upon its way?
In the evening, in the evening;
I listened long to its happy lay,
In the evening, in the evening;
But all my musing seemed but in vain,
And all its music awoke but pain,
In the evening, in the evening.

The blooming thornapple on its bank,
Also listened, also listened,
And flags and buttercups, dewy dank,
Also listened, also listened;
And thrushes nestling in alder-trees,
Did hush their babes with its melodies,
And they listened, and they listened.

I asked the violets on its side,
In the evening, in the evening,—
If they its song would to me confide,
In the evening, in the evening;
And like some children of guileless soul
They said: “Its lay is the song of all,
In the evening, in the evening.”

“The ceaseless longing to reach the sea,
In the evening, in the evening;
The song of life and eternity,
In the evening, in the evening;
A lay of love in the early morn,
A lay of hope to the lone and lorn,—
In the evening, in the evening.”

THE CHILD AND THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN

She pored o’er the open page
Of the Gospel, according to John,
Where the Ruler did Christ engage
At hours of the silent night,
And sought for his soul that light,
Which God sent forth through His Son.

But she could not read a word,
A child of four summers she,
Not ever, even once, had she heard
That story of second birth,
Nor asked, like the wise of the earth,
“O, Lord, how can these things be?”