On Viewing the Skull and Bones of a Wolf

- 1873-1908

How savage, fierce and grim!
     His bones are bleached and white.
But what is death to him?
     He grins as if to bite.
He mocks the fate
     That bade, ''Begone.''
There's fierceness stamped
     In ev'ry bone.
 

Let silence settle from the midnight sky—
Such silence as you've broken with your cry;
The bleak wind howl, unto the ut'most verge
Of this mighty waste, thy fitting dirge.

My Fancy

Why do trees along the river
     Lean so far out o’er the tide?
Very wise men tell me why, but
    I am never satisfied;
And so I keep my fancy still,
    That trees lean out to save
The drowning from the clutches of
    The cold, remorseless wave.

Assured

Be it dark; be it bright;
    Be it pain; be it rest;
Be it wrong; be it right—
    It must be for the best.

Some good must somewhere wait,
    And sometime joy and pain
Must cease to alternate,
    Or else we live in vain.

To Yahola, On His First Birthday

The sky has put her bluest garment on,
    And gently brushed the snowy clouds away;
The robin trills a sweeter melody,
    Because you are just one year old today.

The wind remembers, in his sweet refrains,
    Away, away up in the tossing trees,
That you came in the world a year ago,
    And earth is filled with pleasant harmonies,

            And all things seem to say,
            “Just one year old today.”