Poems From The Breakfast Table | Page 5

of light

from eyes that glisten.
Good by! once more,--and kindly tell
In
words of peace the young world's story,--
And say, besides, we love
too well
Our mothers' soil, our fathers' glory
THE LAST BLOSSOM
THOUGH young no more, we still would dream
Of beauty's dear
deluding wiles;
The leagues of life to graybeards seem
Shorter than
boyhood's lingering miles.
Who knows a woman's wild caprice?
'It played with Goethe's silvered
hair,
And many a Holy Father's "niece"
Has softly smoothed the
papal chair.
When sixty bids us sigh in vain
To melt the heart of sweet sixteen,

We think upon those ladies twain
Who loved so well the tough old
Dean.
We see the Patriarch's wintry face,
The maid of Egypt's dusky glow,

And dream that Youth and Age embrace,
As April violets fill with
snow.
Tranced in her lord's Olympian smile
His lotus-loving Memphian
lies,--
The musky daughter of the Nile,
With plaited hair and
almond eyes.
Might we but share one wild caress
Ere life's autumnal blossoms fall,

And Earth's brown, clinging lips impress
The long cold kiss that
waits us all!
My bosom heaves, remembering yet
The morning of that blissful day,

When Rose, the flower of spring, I met,
And gave my raptured soul
away.
Flung from her eyes of purest blue,
A lasso, with its leaping chain,

Light as a loop of larkspurs, flew
O'er sense and spirit, heart and

brain.
Thou com'st to cheer my waning age,
Sweet vision, waited for so
long!
Dove that would seek the poet's cage
Lured by the magic
breath of song!
She blushes! Ah, reluctant maid,
Love's drapeau rouge the truth has
told!
O' er girlhood's yielding barricade
Floats the great Leveller's
crimson fold!
Come to my arms!--love heeds not years;
No frost the bud of passion
knows.
Ha! what is this my frenzy hears?
A voice behind me
uttered,--Rose!
Sweet was her smile,--but not for me;
Alas! when woman looks too
kind,
Just turn your foolish head and see,--
Some youth is walking
close behind!
CONTENTMENT
"Man wants but little here below "
LITTLE I ask; my wants are few;
I only wish a hut of stone,
(A
very plain brown stone will do,)
That I may call my own;--
And
close at hand is such a one,
In yonder street that fronts the sun.
Plain food is quite enough for me;
Three courses are as good as ten;--

If Nature can subsist on three,
Thank Heaven for three. Amen
I
always thought cold victual nice;--
My choice would be vanilla-ice.
I care not much for gold or land;--
Give me a mortgage here and
there,--
Some good bank-stock, some note of hand,
Or trifling
railroad share,--
I only ask that Fortune send
A little more than I
shall spend.
Honors are silly toys, I know,
And titles are but empty names;
I

would, perhaps, be Plenipo,--
But only near St. James;
I'm very
sure I should not care
To fill our Gubernator's chair.
Jewels are baubles; 't is a sin
To care for such unfruitful things;--

One good-sized diamond in a pin,--
Some, not so large, in rings,--

A ruby, and a pearl, or so,
Will do for me;--I laugh at show.
My dame should dress in cheap attire;
(Good, heavy silks are never
dear;)--
I own perhaps I might desire
Some shawls of true
Cashmere,--
Some marrowy crapes of China silk,
Like wrinkled
skins on scalded milk.
I would not have the horse I drive
So fast that folks must stop and
stare;
An easy gait--two, forty-five--
Suits me; I do not care;--

Perhaps, for just a single spurt,
Some seconds less would do no hurt.
Of pictures, I should like to own
Titians and Raphaels three or four,--

I love so much their style and tone,
One Turner, and no more,
(A
landscape,--foreground golden dirt,--
The sunshine painted with a
squirt.)
Of books but few,--some fifty score
For daily use, and bound for
wear;
The rest upon an upper floor;--
Some little_ luxury _there

Of red morocco's gilded gleam
And vellum rich as country cream
Busts, cameos, gems,--such things as these,
Which others often show
for pride,
I value for their power to please,
And selfish churls
deride;--
One Stradivarius, I confess,
-Two_ Meerschaums, I would
fain possess.
Wealth's wasteful tricks I will not learn,
Nor ape the glittering upstart
fool;--
Shall not carved tables serve my turn,
But all must be of
buhl?

Give grasping pomp its double share,--
I ask but one
recumbent chair.

Thus humble let me live and die,
Nor long for Midas' golden touch;

If Heaven more generous gifts deny,
I shall not miss them much,--

Too grateful for the blessing lent
Of simple tastes and mind content!
AESTIVATION
AN UNPUBLISHED POEM, BY MY LATE LATIN TUTOR
IN candent ire the solar splendor flames;
The foles, langueseent, pend
from arid rames;
His humid front the Give, anheling, wipes,
And
dreams of erring on ventiferous riper.
How dulce to vive occult to mortal eyes,
Dorm on the herb with none
to supervise,
Carp the suave berries from the crescent vine,
And
bibe the flow from longicaudate kine!
To me, alas! no verdurous visions come,
Save yon exiguous pool's
conferva-scum,--
No concave vast repeats the tender hue
That laves
my milk-jug with celestial blue!
Me wretched! Let me curr to quercine shades!
Effund your albid
hausts, lactiferous maids!
Oh, might I vole to some umbrageous
clump,--
Depart,--be off,--excede,--evade,--erump!
THE DEACON'S MASTERPIECE
OR, THE WONDERFUL "ONE-HOSS