Oh, faery finch, whose golden form does climb
    Athwart the starry bays of poesies, sweet,
I hear your voice, and drown in slumber’s clime,
    As I sit, pond’ring in my woolen seat.
My quill spills no sweet word or sweeter song,
    For my heart such cloyed passions cannot game,
And doubly more lies speechless my sore tongue,
    And triply even more, my soul’s the same.

As hours pass, upon these pages, bare
    I stare as if no passion stirs to fly.
To mount into Eutrepe’s mystic lair
    I couldn’t, ‘till your tender lullaby
Had touched my ear, and from my breast awoke
    Some passioned fire, hearing such sweet voice.
Of Heaven’s bells and Heaven’s harps. Out spoke
    Your lilting charms which, magically employs

All of the Muse’s finest strengths and spells:
    Eutrepe’s mystic hymn, Erato’s grace
And Calliope’s trance which softly swells
    In finest verse, and in such verse does trace
Vast time. Oh, finch, were it not for your song
    Nor for you visiting me, worn with age
No words would spill from out my stricken tongue
    And writ wouldn’t be to you, my own homáge.

Down through the Alps, immortal, standing high
Whose feathers are the clouds of passing days
And whose sweet bosoms touch the milky sky
And whose faint breaths birth thick and gentle haze;
Upon the hills and valleys, laced with white
And brushed by bonnets of the passing clouds
There is beneath the mounts, a lovely sight:
Which please all mortal eyes: soft daisy crowds.
Of all unearthly, flowery June treasure
Of all the decors and bouquets of spring
Perchance, the fairest, by all equal measure
Yon daisies, in the moist glades, lingering
    And there where such soft blossoms dance and play
    Are you and I upon a summer day

If Fall shall rob fair summer of her boon,
    And steal the gloried rays of her gold sun,
And dreamy essence of her calming moon,
    Whose beams across the Heaven’s bowers run,

And all her sweets, her candied charms and spells,
    And all the finest beauty of her store,
Then days shall come, in which Cronus compels
    Fall to make grander all that summer bore:

To make the sunshine doubly gold and bud
    Much sweeter, golden blossoms, and then birth
Much fairer fruits, rich with sweet, temp’rate blood
    And feed with triply fresher dew the earth,

And pave the roads with golden folds of wheat
    And piled gourd, and hang the trees with leaves,
And spread with posy flame the glades where meet
    The murm’ring brooks, and where the sunshine weaves

Its silk of light across the morning skies,
    And all the flowered bowers with sweet breath.
Aye, even if the summer clime soon dies
    The Fall shall wreathe a beauty of its death.

When clouds upon the summer breeze all rest
And easeful, take upon their faery flight
Into the paling crimson of the west
Where noonday dreams wilt in the breath of night,
I look into the east, and try to bear
No more a single thought of gloom or tear
For tangled comes my heart in wreathes of drear
For seeing just the day lie on its bier.
Up at the twinkling summer stars I gaze
And far as any falcon, swift, may spy
Lie constellations whose postures can trace
A story of some wild ecstasy;
A tale of unworldly days of yore
When wine flowed free and through the earth did seep
And Heracles stood tall and Phobetor
Was purely myth to scare the young to sleep.
    And as I stare upon these stars, my eyes
    Close then and open to new morning skies.

I fashioned my love’s frown of dull command
    And sneer of some embellished, soundless clay.
    From morning to the night, from night to day
I dwelt nearby my love, and couldn’t stand
To peel my eyes from off her cheek’s faint brand,
    Nor off her lips, embroidered with the ray
    Of gold and ruby, bright as stars of May
Yet cold as winter wrapping autumn land.
    Oh, Venus, my poor heart and stricken soul
        Fell not for women of pure human touch
     For I have dipped myself in folly’s bowl
         But deem it folly I should not, for much
    I’ve loved, but Venus, ever in my dole
         I’ll live if stays to be of icy stone, this statue’s clutch

When summer pierces earth and dying root,
And winds the golden-honeyed flowers sweep,
And liquor rays bathe every bud and shoot,
Newly awakened from the depths of sleep,
When pollen springs forth in white, seasoned clouds,
Miasmic dreams, like visions, pure and sweet,
When gentle rainy mist the land enshrouds,
And tiptoes cross the meads on silent feet,
When sweet, ambrosial bloom shall sprout and bud,
And throw their dreamy breaths to weave a sigh
And cast their milky sap, and sport sweet blood,
And touch the Heavens that bedight the sky,
    Tis time, when fresh and pure is all of love
    But still I worry, for seasons all move

She took many untrodden paths
And dwelt near unknown ways
Few took her in their arms of love
Few took her in their praise
But o, to me she was life’s light
The warmth of summer days

Few ever knew her, her sole friends
Were larks that came to sing
To others hoary she may seem
To me, she’s everything
And I took her up in my care
I took her ‘neath my wing

We flew together, her and I
I took to places, she
Where we livéd together one
In love and harmony
But one gray day she passed away
I dwelt in misery

And now I place a rose upon
Her grave near withered grass
Though very few of people knew
How great she was a lass
And even though she’s lost in time
And though o’er her time does surpass
I’ll keep her in my heart’s sweet clime
For all the years that aged their prime
And all the years to pass…