I am content in dreams to roam my fill
The vagrant, drifting sport of wind and tide,
Slave of the greater freedom, venture's thrill;
Here every magic ship on which I ride.
Gold, green, blue, red, a priceless treasure trove,
More wealth than ever pirate dared to dream.
My hammock swings—about the world I rove.
The sunset's dusk, the dawning's glide and gleam,
Moon-dappled leaves are murmuring in the wind
Which whispers tales. Lo, Tyre is just behind,
Through seas of dawn I sail, Romance abeam.
The Alamo
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For days they ringed us with the flame
For days their swarming soldiers came
The battle wrack was gory
We perished in the smoke and flame,
To give the world their traitor shame
And our undying glory
Always Come Evening
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Riding down the road at evening with the stars or steed and shoon
I have heard an old man singing underneath a copper moon;
"God, who gemmed with topaz twilights, opal portals of the day,
"On our amaranthine mountains, why make human souls of clay?
"For I rode the moon-mare's horses in the glory of my youth,
"Wrestled with the hills at sunset-- till I met brass-tinctured Truth.
"Till I saw the temples topple, till I saw the idols reel,
"Till my brain had turned to iron, and my heart had turned to steel.
"Satan, Satan, brother Satan, fill my soul with frozen fire;
"Feed with hearts of rose-white women ashes of my dead desire.
"For my road runs out in thistles and my dreams have turned to dust.
"And my pinions fade and falter to the raven wings of rust.
"Truth has smitten me with arrows and her hand is in my hair--
"Youth, she hides in yonder mountains -- go and see her, if you dare!
"Work your magic, brother Satan, fill my brain with fiery spells.
"Satan, Satan, brother Satan, have known your fiercest Hells."
Riding down the road at evening when the wind was on the sea,
I have heard an old man singing, and he sang most drearily
Strange to hear, when dark lakes shimmer to the wailing of the loon,
Amethystine Homer singing under evening's copper moon.
Ambition
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Build me a gibbet against the sky,
Solid and strong and long miles high,
Let me hang where the high winds blow
That never stoop to the world below,
And the great clouds lumber by.
Let the people who toil below
See me swaying to and fro,
See me swinging the aeons through,
A dancing dot in the distant blue.
An American
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Sing of my ancestors!
Sing of them with pride!
Sing of fair America,
Green prairies and blue tide!
One was born in County Cork!
Hail the shamrock green!
(One was named Abraham
Simeon Levine.)
One held rule in Dundee,
Friend of the Montrose.
(One sold nuts and apples
Where the river Tiber flows.)
One drank ale in Devonshire,
One scaled Lomond's crags.
(One grew up in Warsaw
And peddled clothes and rags.)
One sailed out from Liverpool,
Bold and free and glad.
(One lended cash at high
Rates in Petrograd.)
Och, oi, oi, and hoot mon!
Gott sie dank go bragh!
Gevald! Be dommed! Diavoli!
America iss braw!
Shure, its meself thot loves the land,
Vy shouldn't I? Oi oi!
Some fellow he no lika diss,
I'm nae you kind o' boy!
Its aiche mon for his ain, py hell!
A feller got to stand
An' tella people who he iss
And brag on his own land!
Vun nation unt vun langvitche!
Oi! And go for business fine
To Michael Israel Malcolmsky
Gammettio O'Stein.
An American Epic
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The autumn sun was gettin' low, the day was mighty windy,
When Hiram shot the hired man that kissed his girl Dorindy.
Them two was in the orchard there,
for apples birds was peckin'
When old man Hiram hove in view
and busted up their neckin'.
The hired man he took it out across the fields and ditches
But Hiram drawed a perfect bead
and shot him in the breeches.
The hired man he flagged it on, for he knew other ladies—
But Robert Frost can write the rest, or he can go to Hades.
Arcadian Days
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Back in days of green Arcady when the world was young and free,
I toiled for gold in the days of old, in Arcady, green Arcady.
Mighty-thewed, mape-limbed, in the world-dawn haze,
For I was a sword-smith in those old, gold days,
Early in the morning, how my sledge would clang!
Through the sapphire evening how the red sparks sprang!
How my hammer boomed on bronze hilt and shaft!
How the anvil clashed, and the forge, how it laughed.
Glowing through the dusk of the whispering night,
Beating up the morning with its rose-red light!
But Zeus! How I labored! And Jove! How I sweat!
And I grumbled o’er my anvil with a fume and a fret.
For I rose at the dawn and I labored like a slave
For nobles that cursed me for a fool and a knave;
Until late at night and to my hut I’d gone,
To rise again, to toil again with the coming of the dawn.
Mountains on the sky-line, whisper of the sea,
Croon of the nightwind, they all called to me!
And I thrilled at the vistas that swept down the gorge,
For poetry was in me—but it sweltered at the forge.
So I grumbled as I hammered o the sullen metal stark
And I loomed through the smoke like a goblin of the dark.
And the grimy soot caked on the hair of my arms
And I cursed at the yokels plodding in from the farms.
Plodding from the farms and the vineyards on the hill
With the wine of the grape and the golden apple-mill,
As close by the forge, they’d stop a-gape to stare
At my long ape-arms and my wild, shaggy hair.