1227

My Triumph lasted till the Drums
Had left the Dead alone
And then I dropped my Victory
And chastened stole along
To where the finished Faces
Conclusion turned on me
And then I hated Glory
And wished myself were They.

What is to be is best descried
When it has also been—
Could Prospect taste of Retrospect
The tyrannies of Men
Were Tenderer—diviner
The Transitive toward.
A Bayonet’s contrition
Is nothing to the Dead.

1549

My Wars are laid away in Books—
I have one Battle more—
A Foe whom I have never seen
But oft has scanned me o’er—
And hesitated me between
And others at my side,
But chose the best—Neglecting me—till
All the rest, have died—
How sweet if I am not forgot
By Chums that passed away—
Since Playmates at threescore and ten
Are such a scarcity—

10

My wheel is in the dark!
I cannot see a spoke
Yet know its dripping feet
Go round and round.

My foot is on the Tide!
An unfrequented road—
Yet have all roads
A clearing at the end—

Some have resigned the Loom—
Some in the busy tomb
Find quaint employ—

Some with new—stately feet—
Pass royal through the gate—
Flinging the problem back
At you and I!

751

My Worthiness is all my Doubt—
His Merit—all my fear—
Contrasting which, my quality
Do lowlier—appear—

Lest I should insufficient prove
For His beloved Need—
The Chiefest Apprehension
Upon my thronging Mind—

’Tis true—that Deity to stoop
Inherently incline—
For nothing higher than Itself
Itself can rest upon—

So I—the undivine abode
Of His Elect Content—
Conform my Soul—as ’twere a Church,
Unto Her Sacrament—

1170

Nature affects to be sedate
Upon occasion, grand
But let our observation shut
Her practices extend

To Necromancy and the Trades
Remote to understand
Behold our spacious Citizen
Unto a Juggler turned—

835

Nature and God—I neither knew
Yet Both so well knew me
They startled, like Executors
Of My identity.

Yet Neither told—that I could learn—
My Secret as secure
As Herschel’s private interest
Or Mercury’s affair—

1336

Nature assigns the Sun—
That—is Astronomy—
Nature cannot enact a Friend—
That—is Astrology.

1673

Nature can do no more
She has fulfilled her Dyes
Whatever Flower fail to come
Of other Summer days
Her crescent reimburse
If other Summers be
Nature’s imposing negative
Nulls opportunity—

668

“Nature” is what we see—
The Hill—the Afternoon—
Squirrel—Eclipse—the Bumble bee—
Nay—Nature is Heaven—
Nature is what we hear—
The Bobolink—the Sea—
Thunder—the Cricket—
Nay—Nature is Harmony—
Nature is what we know—
Yet have no art to say—
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity.

1045

Nature rarer uses Yellow
Than another Hue.
Saves she all of that for Sunsets
Prodigal of Blue

Spending Scarlet, like a Woman
Yellow she affords
Only scantly and selectly
Like a Lover’s Words.

314

Nature—sometimes sears a Sapling—
Sometimes—scalps a Tree—
Her Green People recollect it
When they do not die—

Fainter Leaves—to Further Seasons—
Dumbly testify—
We—who have the Souls—
Die oftener—Not so vitally—

790

Nature—the Gentlest Mother is,
Impatient of no Child—
The feeblest—or the waywardest—
Her Admonition mild—

In Forest—and the Hill—
By Traveller—be heard—
Restraining Rampant Squirrel—
Or too impetuous Bird—

How fair Her Conversation—
A Summer Afternoon—
Her Household—Her Assembly—
And when the Sung go down—

Her Voice among the Aisles
Incite the timid prayer
Of the minutest Cricket—
The most unworthy Flower—

When all the Children sleep—
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light Her lamps—
Then bending from the Sky—

With infinite Affection—
And infiniter Care—
Her Golden finger on Her lip—
Wills Silence—Everywhere—

746

Never for Society
He shall seek in vain—
Who His own acquaintance
Cultivate—Of Men
Wiser Men may weary—
But the Man within

Never knew Satiety—
Better entertain
Than could Border Ballad—
Or Biscayan Hymn—
Neither introduction
Need You—unto Him—

99

New feet within my garden go—
New fingers stir the sod—
A Troubadour upon the Elm
Betrays the solitude.

New children play upon the green—
New Weary sleep below—
And still the pensive Spring returns—
And still the punctual snow!

1516

No Autumn’s intercepting Chill
Appalls this Tropic Breast—
But African Exuberance
And Asiatic rest.

755

No Bobolink—reverse His Singing
When the only Tree
Ever He minded occupying
By the Farmer be—

Clove to the Root—
His Spacious Future—
Best Horizon—gone—
Whose Music be His
Only Anodyne—
Brave Bobolink—

35

Nobody knows this little Rose—
It might a pilgrim be
Did I not take it from the ways
And lift it up to thee.
Only a Bee will miss it—
Only a Butterfly,
Hastening from far journey—
On its breast to lie—
Only a Bird will wonder—
Only a Breeze will sigh—
Ah Little Rose—how easy
For such as thee to die!

1561

No Brigadier throughout the Year
So civic as the Jay—
A Neighbor and a Warrior too
With shrill felicity
Pursuing Winds that censure us
A February Day,
The Brother of the Universe
Was never blown away—
The Snow and he are intimate—
I’ve often seem them play
When Heaven looked upon us all
With such severity
I felt apology were due
To an insulted sky
Whose pompous frown was Nutriment
To their Temerity—
The Pillow of this daring Head
Is pungent Evergreens—
His Larder—terse and Militant—
Unknown—refreshing things—
His Character—a Tonic—
His future—a Dispute—
Unfair an Immortality
That leaves this Neighbor out—

515

No Crowd that has occurred
Exhibit—I suppose
That General Attendance
That Resurrection—does—

Circumference be full—
The long restricted Grave
Assert her Vital Privilege—
The Dust—connect—and live—

On Atoms—features place—
All Multitudes that were
Efface in the Comparison—
As Suns—dissolve a star—

Solemnity—prevail—
Its Individual Doom
Possess each separate Consciousness—
August—Absorbed—Numb—

What Duplicate—exist—
What Parallel can be—
Of the Significance of This—
To Universe—and Me?

1574

No ladder needs the bird but skies
To situate its wings,
Nor any leader’s grim baton
Arraigns it as it sings.
The implements of bliss are few—
As Jesus says of Him,
“Come unto me” the moiety
That wafts the cherubim.

1626

No Life can pompless pass away—
The lowliest career
To the same Pageant wends its way
As that exalted here—

How cordial is the mystery!
The hospitable Pall
A “this way” beckons spaciously—
A Miracle for all!

477

No Man can compass a Despair—
As round a Goalless Road
No faster than a Mile at once
The Traveller proceed—

Unconscious of the Width—
Unconscious that the Sun
Be setting on His progress—
So accurate the One

At estimating Pain—
Whose own—has just begun—
His ignorance—the Angel
That pilot Him along—

1733

No man saw awe, nor to his house
Admitted he a man
Though by his awful residence
Has human nature been.

Not deeming of his dread abode
Till laboring to flee
A grasp on comprehension laid
Detained vitality.

Returning is a different route
The Spirit could not show
For breathing is the only work
To be enacted now.

“Am not consumed,” old Moses wrote,
“Yet saw him face to face”—
That very physiognomy
I am convinced was this.

704

No matter—now—Sweet—
But when I’m Earl—
Won’t you wish you’d spoken
To that dull Girl?

Trivial a Word—just—
Trivial—a Smile—
But won’t you wish you’d spared one
When I’m Earl?

I shan’t need it—then—
Crests—will do—
Eagles on my Buckles—
On my Belt—too—

Ermine—my familiar Gown—
Say—Sweet—then
Won’t you wish you’d smiled—just—
Me upon?

1541

No matter where the Saints abide,
They make their Circuit fair
Behold how great a Firmament
Accompanies a Star.

771

None can experience sting
Who Bounty—have not known—
The fact of Famine—could not be
Except for Fact of Corn—

Want—is a meagre Art
Acquired by Reverse—
The Poverty that was not Wealth—
Cannot be Indigence.

1110

None who saw it ever told it
’Tis as hid as Death
Had for that specific treasure
A departing breath—
Surfaces may be invested
Did the Diamond grow
General as the Dandelion
Would you serve it so?

804

No Notice gave She, but a Change—
No Message, but a Sigh—
For Whom, the Time did not suffice
That She should specify.

She was not warm, though Summer shone
Nor scrupulous of cold
Though Rime by Rime, the steady Frost
Upon Her ***** piled—

Of shrinking ways—she did not fright
Though all the Village looked—
But held Her gravity aloft—
And met the gaze—direct—

And when adjusted like a Seed
In careful fitted Ground
Unto the Everlasting Spring
And hindered but a Mound

Her Warm return, if so she chose—
And We—imploring drew—
Removed our invitation by
As Some She never knew—

931

Noon—is the Hinge of Day—
Evening—the Tissue Door—
Morning—the East compelling the sill
Till all the World is ajar—

982

No Other can reduce
Our mortal Consequence
Like the remembering it be nought
A Period from hence
But Contemplation for
Contemporaneous Nought
Our Single Competition
Jehovah’s Estimate.

1406

No Passenger was known to flee—
That lodged a night in memory—
That wily—subterranean Inn
Contrives that none go out again—

720

No Prisoner be—
Where Liberty—
Himself—abide with Thee—

384

No Rack can torture me—
My Soul—at Liberty—
Behind this mortal Bone
There knits a bolder One—

You cannot ***** with saw—
Nor pierce with Scimitar—
Two Bodies—therefore be—
Bind One—The Other fly—

The Eagle of his Nest
No easier divest—
And gain the Sky
Than mayest Thou—

Except Thyself may be
Thine Enemy—
Captivity is Consciousness—
So’s Liberty.

1029

Nor Mountain hinder Me
Nor Sea—
Who’s Baltic—
Who’s Cordillera?

669

No Romance sold unto
Could so enthrall a Man
As the perusal of
His Individual One—
’Tis Fiction’s—When ’tis small enough
To Credit—’Tisn’t true!

990

Not all die early, dying young—
Maturity of Fate
Is consummated equally
In Ages, or a Night—

A Hoary Boy, I’ve known to drop
Whole statured—by the side
Of Junior of Fourscore—’twas Act
Not Period—that died.

1256

Not any higher stands the Grave
For Heroes than for Men—
Not any nearer for the Child
Than numb Three Score and Ten—

This latest Leisure equal lulls
The Beggar and his Queen
Propitiate this Democrat
A Summer’s Afternoon—

1344

Not any more to be lacked—
Not any more to be known—
Denizen of Significance
For a span so worn—

Even Nature herself
Has forgot it is there—
Sedulous of her Multitudes
Notwithstanding Despair—

Of the Ones that pursued it
Suing it not to go
Some have solaced the longing
To accompany—

Some—rescinded the Wrench—
Others—Shall I say
Plated the residue of Adz
With Monotony.

1674

Not any sunny tone
From any fervent zone
Find entrance there—
Better a grave of Balm
Toward human nature’s home—
And Robins near—
Than a stupendous Tomb
Proclaiming to the Gloom
How dead we are—

1590

Not at Home to Callers
Says the Naked Tree—
Bonnet due in April—
Wishing you Good Day—

418

Not in this World to see his face—
Sounds long—until I read the place
Where this—is said to be
But just the Primer—to a life—
Unopened—rare—Upon the Shelf—
Clasped yet—to Him—and Me—

And yet—My Primer suits me so
I would not choose—a Book to know
Than that—be sweeter wise—
Might some one else—so learned—be—
And leave me—just my A—B—C—
Himself—could have the Skies—

1619

Not knowing when the Dawn will come,
I open every Door,
Or has it Feathers, like a Bird,
Or Billows, like a Shore—

1303

Not One by Heaven defrauded stay—
Although he seem to steal
He restitutes in some sweet way
Secreted in his will—

346

Not probable—The barest Chance—
A smile too few—a word too much
And far from Heaven as the Rest—
The Soul so close on Paradise—

What if the Bird from journey far—
Confused by Sweets—as Mortals—are—
Forget the secret of His wing
And perish—but a Bough between—
Oh, Groping feet—
Oh Phantom Queen!

685

Not “Revelation”—’tis—that waits,
But our unfurnished eyes—

1518

Not seeing, still we know—
Not knowing, guess—
Not guessing, smile and hide
And half caress—

And quake—and turn away,
Seraphic fear—
Is Eden’s innuendo
“If you dare”?

1613

Not Sickness stains the Brave,
Nor any Dart,
Nor Doubt of Scene to come,
But an adjourning Heart—

1040

Not so the infinite Relations—Below
Division is Adhesion’s forfeit—On High
Affliction but a Speculation—And Woe
A Fallacy, a Figment, We knew—

1435

Not that he goes—we love him more
Who led us while he stayed.
Beyond earth’s trafficking frontier,
For what he moved, he made.

823

Not that We did, shall be the test
When Act and Will are done
But what Our Lord infers We would
Had We diviner been—