The Bracelet Of Grass

        The opal heart of afternoon
        Was clouding on to throbs of storm,
        Ashen within the ardent west
        The lips of thunder muttered harm,
        And as a bubble like to break
        Hung heaven's trembling amethyst,
        When with the sedge-grass by the lake
        I braceleted her wrist.

        And when the ribbon grass was tied,
        Sad with the happiness we planned,
        Palm linked in palm we stood awhile
        And watched the raindrops dot the sand;
        Until the anger of the breeze
        Chid all the lake's bright breathing down,
        And ravished all the radiancies
        From her deep eyes of brown.

        We gazed from shelter on the storm,
        And through our hearts swept ghostly pain
        To see the shards of day sweep past,
        Broken, and none might mend again.
        Broken, that none shall ever mend;
        Loosened, that none shall ever tie.
        O the wind and the wind, will it never end?
        O the sweeping past of the ruined sky!

William Vaughn Moody

William Vaughn Moody was an American poet, dramatist, and professor born on July 8, 1869, in Spencer, Indiana. He graduated from Harvard University in 1893 and later joined its faculty teaching English literature. His notable works include the play "The Great Divide" and the poem "An Ode in Time of Hesitation." Moody was part of the Chicago literary renaissance. He passed away on October 17, 1910.

William Vaughn Moody

Heart's Wild-Flower

William Vaughn Moody, Simple Poetry

How The Mead-Slave Was Set Free

William Vaughn Moody, Simple Poetry

A Dialogue In Purgatory

William Vaughn Moody, Simple Poetry

Faded Pictures

William Vaughn Moody, Simple Poetry

English

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Rain On A Grave

Clouds spout upon her
    Their waters amain
    In ruthless disdain, -
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She who to shelter
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Would that I lay there
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The Departure

        I

        I sat beside the glassy evening sea,
        One foot upon the thin horn of my lyre,
        And all its strings of laughter and desire
        Crushed in the rank wet grasses heedlessly;
        Nor did my dull eyes care to question how
        The boat close by had spread its saffron sails,
        Nor what might mean the coffers and the bales,
        And streaks of new wine on the gilded prow.
        Neither was wonder in me when I saw
        Fair women step therein, though they were fair
        Even to adoration and to awe,
        And in the gracious fillets of their hair
        Were blossoms from a garden I had known,
        Sweet mornings ere the apple buds were blown.


        II

        One gazed steadfas...

William Vaughn Moody

Jetsam

        I wonder can this be the world it was
        At sunset? I remember the sky fell
        Green as pale meadows, at the long street-ends,
        But overhead the smoke-wrack hugged the roofs
        As if to shut the city from God's eyes
        Till dawn should quench the laughter and the lights.
        Beneath the gas flare stolid faces passed,
        Too dull for sin; old loosened lips set hard
        To drain the stale lees from the cup of sense;
        Or if a young face yearned from out the mist
        Made by its own bright hair, the eyes were wan
        With desolate fore-knowledge of the end.
        My life lay waste about me: as I walked,
        From the gross dark of unfrequented streets
        The face of my own youth peered forth at me,

William Vaughn Moody

The Old Oak.

Friend of my early days, we meet once more!
Once more I stand thine aged boughs beneath,
And hear again the rustling music pour,
Along thy leaves, as whispering spirits breathe.

Full many a day of sunshine and of storm,
Since last we parted, both have surely known;
Thy leaves are thinned, decrepit is thy form,
And all my cherished visions, they are flown!

How beautiful, how brief, those sunny hours
Departed now, when life was in its spring
When Fancy knew no scene undecked with flowers,
And Expectation flew on Fancy's wing!

Here, on the bank, beside this whispering stream,
Which still runs by as gayly as of yore,
Marking its eddies, I was wont to dream
Of things away, on some far fairy shore.

Then every whirling leaf and bubbling ball,<...

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A Rune Of The Rain

O many-toned rain!
O myriad sweet voices of the rain!
How welcome is its delicate overture
At evening, when the moist and glowing west
Seals all things with cool promise of night's rest.

At first it would allure
The earth to kinder mood,
With dainty flattering
Of soft, sweet pattering:
Faintly now you hear the tramp
Of the fine drops, falling damp
On the dry, sun-seasoned ground
And the thirsty leaves, resound.
But anon, imbued
With a sudden, bounding access
Of passion, it relaxes
All timider persuasion.
And, with nor pretext nor occasion,
Its wooing redoubles;
And pounds the ground, and bubbles
In sputtering spray,
Flinging itself in a fury
Of flashing white away;
Till the dusty road,
Dank-perfumed, is o'erflowed;...

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The Casket Of Opals

I

Deep, smoldering colors of the land and sea
Burn in these stones, that, by some mystery,
Wrap fire in sleep and never are consumed.
Scarlet of daybreak, sunset gleams half spent
In thick white cloud; pale moons that may have lent
Light to love's grieving; rose-illumined snows,
And veins of gold no mine depth ever gloomed;
All these, and green of thin-edged waves, are there.
I think a tide of feeling through them flows
With blush and pallor, as if some being of air, -
Some soul once human, - wandering, in the snare
Of passion had been caught, and henceforth doomed
In misty crystal here to lie entombed.

And so it is, indeed. Here prisoned sleep
The ardors and the moods and all the pain
That once within a man's heart throbbed. He gave
These opa...

George Parsons Lathrop