An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small, In blast-beruffled plume, Had chosen thus to fling his soul Upon the growing gloom. So little cause for carolings Of such ecstatic sound Was written on terrestrial things Afar or nigh around, That I could think there trembled through His happy good-night air Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew And I was unaware.

I leant upon a coppice gate When Frost was spectre-gray, And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day.

The Earth, say'st thou? The Human race? By Me created? Sad its lot? Nay: I have no remembrance of such place: Such world I fashioned not.

When false things are brought low, And swift things have grown slow, Feigning like froth shall go, Faith be for aye.

Beneath the crisp and wintry carpet hid A million buds but stay their blossoming And trustful birds have built their nests amid The shuddering boughs, and only…

When the mariner, sailing over tropic seas, looks for relief from his weary watch, he turns his eyes toward the southern cross, burning luridly above the tempe…

See how I fall like the snow, Come to cover the lovers, (But don't you wake them up) Come to sparkle the dark up, With just a touch of make up. Come to cover t…