IF from out the Happy Valley,
Leaving the Olympian Ballet,
The Immortals forth should sally,
Wings unfurled;
Kicking o’er their starry traces,
If they sought more mundane spaces,
Would they fill their old-time places
In the world?
Would the jeux d’esprit of “Sherry,”
Monstrous witty, wondrous merry,
To the “Vagabonds” seem very
Much a bore?
In the after-dinner Babel,
Flashing silver through their sable,
Would great “Titmarsh” set the table
In a roar?
Would the world be much indebted
To the Beau George Regent petted?
Would his garments be regretted,
Or the rage?
Would the Golden Sarah, sprightly,
Wear her laurel-crown as lightly
If the Grander Sarah nightly
Queened the stage?
Would the Dictionary Doctor,
Sulky as a College proctor.
By the “Savages” be mocked, or
Chaired in state?
Would the Commons be elated
If its bygone shades orated
(Say that Fox and Pitt debated),
Or irate?
Should th’ Immortals hither scurry
(Though they’ve got no cause to hurry)
Would they waken joy or worry?
Who can tell?
But they suffer no translation
From their sphere of elevation,
And, in view of complication,
It is well.
THE LOST LAND
HAUGH the light and the love and the laughter,
Half the fruit and the fulness of earth,
Have sunk in the gloom that hereafter
Will make mute all life’s music and mirth.
Lost land of Bohemia, we mourn you,
Despond and desire and deplore;
Thou the pride of the Philistine scorn you,
Lotos-land, what a glamour you bore!
Veiled visions of youth, when Love, breathless,
In the meshes he wove, was ensnared,
We adored you with vows that were deathless
While our last crust and penny we shared.
Then Fame was the phantom we followed,
And Gold was the gain we denied,
And Want was the monster that swallowed
The pleasure of Art and its pride.