But give God time; and life is but a span,
Nine inches, while before it and behind
Stretches the garden of the cosmic gods;
For after London, England shall be wild,
And none can thaw the iceberg at the pole.
In Solitude one sees the winding trace
Of what has been a road, a block of stone
Footworn, that lies along the dim pathway
Before one old foundation; and the rest
Is freaks of grass among the rising growth
Of birch and maple that another year
Shall see almost a forest.

INFINITY

I DARE not think that thou art by, to stand

And face omnipotence so near at hand!

RICHARD SOMERS

His body lies upon the shore,
Afar from his beloved land,

And over him shine tropic suns;
No more he thrills at sound of guns,
No longer, cutlass in his hand,
Cries, "Follow me!" and goes before.

Above him droop the languid trees,
Athirst and fainting with the noon;
Around him drowsy lizards crawl.
No more he hears the boatswain's
call,

Nor sees the waters rock the moon,
Nor smells the keen and salty breeze.

Vain roars old Ocean in his ear,

Calling to him from mighty deeps, Yearning for him who loved the main. Never shall he make sail again; Under the restless sands he sleeps, He is at rest, he cannot hear.

But when the Trumpet sounds alarms
On that great day when all shall rise,
And earth and sea give up their
dead,

Then out from his unquiet bed
Where now heroic SOMERS lies
His soul will leap to Ocean's arms!

JOY ENOUGH

INTO the caverns of the sea
Shall all at last descend,
Who now press forward gallantly
Unrecking of the end."

And no man knoweth what is there,
Nor when his time shall come
To yield his soul and take his share
With all those gone and dumb.

It may be we shall find our kin
Waiting to grasp our hands,
And lead us glorified within,
Over the shining sands;

It may be we with them shall lie,
While heaven and earth abide,
Swaying silent with sightless eye
There in the sluggish tide.

The fair-haired keeper of their love and trust.

Now limb doth mingle with dissolved limb In nature's busy old democracy

To flush the mountain laurel when she blows Sweet by the southern sea,

And heart with crumbled heart climbs in the rose:

The untaught hearts with the high heart that knew

This mountain fortress for no earthly hold Of temporal quarrel, but the bastion old Of spiritual wrong,

Built by an unjust nation sheer and strong, Expugnable but by a nation's rue

And bowing down before that equal shrine By all men held divine,

Whereof his band and he were the most holy sign.

"NO HINT OF STAIN"

We are our fathers' sons: let those who lead us know!

'Twas only yesterday sick Cuba's cry Came up the tropic wind, "Now help us, for we die!"

Then Alabama heard,

And rising, pale, to Maine and Idaho
Shouted a burning word;

Proud state with proud impassioned state conferred,

And at the lifting of a hand sprang forth,
East, west, and south, and north,
Beautiful armies. Oh, by the sweet blood
and young

Shed on the awful hill slope at San Juan,
By the unforgotten names of eager boys
Who might have tasted girls' love and been
stung

With the old mystic joys

And starry griefs, now the spring nights

curving coral bar,

Smelt the good green smell of grass and shrub and tree.

We had barely room for swinging with the tide

There were many of us crowded in the bay:

Three Germans, and the English ship, beside

Our three- and from the Trenton where
she lay,

Through the sunset calms and after,
We could hear the shrill, sweet laughter
Of the children's voices on the shore at
play.

We all knew a storm was coming, but,
dear God! no man could dream
Of the furious hell-horrors of that day:

Through the roar of winds and waters we could hear wild voices scream

See the rocking masts reel by us through the spray.

In the gale we drove and drifted helplessly,

With our rudder gone, our engine-fires

drowned,

And none might hope another hour to

see;

For all the air was desperate with the sound

Of the brave ships rent asunder — Of the shrieking souls sucked under, 'Neath the waves, where many a good

man's grave was found.

About noon, upon our quarter, from the deeper gloom afar,

Came the English man-of-war Calliope. "We have lost our anchors, comrades, and, though small the chances are,

We must steer for safety and the open sea."

Then we climbed aloft to cheer her as she passed

Through the tempest and the blackness and the foam: