My songs should be as lilies fair, And roses made of crimson light, To lie amid the fragrant hair And on the breast of my delight. Such glory is for them too high;

(For Aline) Homer, they tell us, was blind and… Looking up into his own and reflec… Yet did he seem Gifted with eyes that could follow…

There was a gentle hostler (And blessed be his name!) He opened up the stable The night Our Lady came. Our Lady and Saint Joseph,

1 My shoulders ache beneath my… 2 (Lie easier, Cross, upon Hi… 3 I march with feet that burn… 4 (Tread, Holy Feet, upon my… 5 Men shout at me who may not…

Whenever I walk to Suffern along… I go by a poor old farmhouse with… I suppose I’ve passed it a hundre… And look at the house, the tragic… I never have seen a haunted house,…

(For S.M.L.) I like to look at the blossomy tra… But it isn’t half so fine a sight… When it all was covered over with… And over the crisp and radiant roa…

There’s a brook on the side of Gr… But there’s nothing there now but… I fished there many a Summer day… And I never quit without getting… There was a man, Dave Lilly, who…

Because we never build a nest And no one of us ever sings, We are the butt of every jest That strutting loud-mouthed robin… Unless the field with laughter rin…

For blows on the fort of evil That never shows a breach, For terrible life-long races To a goal no foot can reach, For reckless leaps into darkness

(For Alden March) With drooping sail and pennant That never a wind may reach, They float in sunless waters Beside a sunless beach.

(For Aline) From what old ballad, or from what… Did you descend to glorify the ear… Was it from Chaucer’s singing boo… Or did Watteau’s small brushes gi…

(For Thomas Walsh) On nights like this the huddled sh… Are like white clouds upon the gra… And merry herdsmen guard their sle… And chat and watch the big stars p…

Severe against the pleasant arc of… The great stone box is cruelly dis… The street becomes more dreary fro… And vagrant breezes touch its wall… Here sullen convicts in their chai…

(For A. K. K.) What distant mountains thrill and… Beneath our Lady Folly’s tread? Why has she left us, wise in woe, Shrewd, practical, uncomforted?

We who beg for bread as we daily t… Country lane and city street, Let us kneel and pray on the broad… To the saint with the vagrant feet… Our altar light is a buttercup bri…