Sweet lips, that never know disdain: 
And hearts, for passion over fain;
Fond, trusting hearts that know no stain
  Of scorn for hearts that love like mine.—­
      Why should I pine?

Because all dreams I entertain
Of beauty wear thy form, Elain;
  And e’en their lips and eyes are thine: 
  So though I gladly would resign
All love, I love, and still complain,
      “Why should I pine?”

When Lydia Smiles

When Lydia smiles, I seem to see
The walls around me fade and flee;
  And, lo, in haunts of hart and hind
  I seem with lovely Rosalind,
In Arden ’neath the greenwood tree: 
The day is drowsy with the bee,
And one wild bird flutes dreamily,
  And all the mellow air is kind,
          When Lydia smiles.

Ah, me! what were this world to me
Without her smile!—­What poetry,
  What glad hesperian paths I find
  Of love, that lead my soul and mind
To happy hills of Arcady,
          When Lydia smiles!

The Rose

You have forgot:  it once was red
With life, this rose, to which you said,—­
  When, there in happy days gone by,
  You plucked it, on my breast to lie,—­
“Sleep there, O rose! how sweet a bed
Is thine!—­And, heart, be comforted;
For, though we part and roses shed
  Their leaves and fade, love cannot die.—­”
          You have forgot.

So by those words of yours I’m led
To send it you this day you wed. 
  Look well upon it.  You, as I,
  Should ask it now, without a sigh,
If love can lie as it lies dead.—­
          You have forgot.

A Ballad of Sweethearts

Summer may come, in sun-blonde splendor,
To reap the harvest that Springtime sows;
And Fall lead in her old defender,
  Winter, all huddled up in snows: 
  Ever a-south the love-wind blows
Into my heart, like a vane asway
  From face to face of the girls it knows—­
But who is the fairest it’s hard to say.

If Carrie smile or Maud look tender,
  Straight in my bosom the gladness glows;
But scarce at their side am I all surrender
  When Gertrude sings where the garden grows: 
  And my heart is a bloom, like the red rose shows
For her hand to gather and toss away,
  Or wear on her breast, as her fancy goes—­
But who is the fairest it’s hard to say.

Let Laura pass, as a sapling slender,
  Her cheek a berry, her mouth a rose,—­
Or Blanche or Helen,—­to each I render
  The worship due to the charms she shows: 
  But Mary’s a poem when these are prose;
Here at her feet my life I lay;
  All of devotion to her it owes—­
But who is the fairest it’s hard to say.

How can my heart of my hand dispose? 
  When Ruth and Clara, and Kate and May,
In form and feature no flaw disclose—­
  But who is the fairest it’s hard to say.