AN OLD HOUSE
I LOVE an old house, It is like an aged face, The worn lines, The strange, defeated grace.
Sorrow looks through these windows Through the crooked glass. And the sill is hollow Where Death’s feet pass.
But there is yet a beauty, A triumph, a haughty thrust; The meek defiance of ancient loveliness Before the dust is dust.
MOONRISE
LIKE a white lotus flower the moon unfolds Her luminous petals and the stars grow pale. Vague mists withdraw, grey shadows o’er the water Shadows of twilight tremulous and frail. The flutes of dusk are still; new worlds unveil; God for such moments made the nightingale.
And yet, O Philomel, thou couldst not chant From the cool shadow of a cedar tree, So high a lay as this I hear in rapture, The song his utter silence sings to me. Of the brown earth is thy winged melody. But God is in this wordless ecstasy.