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And golden laughter in your lady's bower,
And silver-gold in your love's bitter hour.

You showed us, burdened with our hopes and fears,
Laughter and tears.

Poor tears that fell upon the thirsty sands,
Poor laughter stifled with ungentle hands,
Poor heart that was so sweet to laugh and cry,
Your joyful, mournful songs shall never die,
But show us still across the shadowing years
Laughter and tears.

E. A. Mackintosh, M. C.

WHEN SHAKESPEARE LAUGHED *

When Shakespeare laughed, the fun began!
Even the tavern barmaids ran

To choke in secret, and unbent
A lace, to ease their merriment.

The Mermaid rocked to hear the man.

Then Ben his aching girth would span,
And roar above his pasty pan,

"Avast there, Will, for I am spent!"
When Shakespeare laughed.

I'faith, let him be grave who can
When Falstaff, Puck and Caliban
In one explosive jest are blent.
The boatman on the river lent
An ear to hear the mirthful clan
When Shakespeare laughed.
Christopher Morley

* From The Rocking Horse by Christopher Morley. Copyright 1919, George H. Doran Company, Publishers.

WITH PIPE AND BOOK

With Pipe and Book at close of day,
O! what is sweeter, mortal, say;

It matters not what book on knee,
Old Izaak or the Odyssey,

It matters not meerschaum or clay.

And though one's eyes will dream astray,
And lips forget to sue or sway,
It is "enough to merely Be,"
With Pipe and Book.

What though our modern skies be grey,
As bards aver, I will not pray

For "soothing Death" to succour me, But ask thus much, O Fate, of thee,A little longer here to stay

With Pipe and Book.

Richard Le Gallienne

THE OLD AND THE NEW

The Old Year goes down-hill so slow
And silent that he seems to know

The mighty march of time, foretelling
His departure; to his eyelids welling
Come tears of bitter pain and woe.

The lusty blast can scarce forego
His cape about his ears to blow,
As feebly to his final dwelling
The Old Year goes!

Within the belfry, row on row,
The bells are swinging to and fro;

Now joyfully the chimes are swelling

Now solemn and few the notes are knelling

For here the New Year comes:-and lo!
The Old Year goes!

Brander Matthews

THE NEW YEAR

The ships go down to take the sea.
Who seeks the dawn-pale mystery
That lies beyond the violet bays?
What masts shall dip into the haze,
Slip through, to where the sea-lights be?

Oh, valiant young explorers we!
Of the dim seas hope makes us free:
Into the dawn-gray water-ways

The ships go down.

And none may know for what far quay
Their sails are set, or what their fee.

Some bear rich freights through golden days;
Some come to where the dim sea sways

And breaks, and, vanquished utterly,

The ships go down.

Rose Macaulay

OLD YEAR

The old sea-ways send up their tide;
The battered ships to harbour ride.
In the deep seas beyond the bar,
Where the great winds and waters are,
The drifting ships have dropped their pride:

When for the morning seas they plied,
Who but young Hope should be their guide,
To steer them through the rocks that scar
The old sea-ways?

Into the port they reel and slide,
So for a little space abide,

Waiting the gleam of the dawn-star
To seek new waters, strange and far,
But no more shall their keels divide
The old sea-ways.

Rose Macaulay

SLEEP

O happy sleep! that bear'st upon thy breast
The blood-red poppy of enchanting rest,

Draw near me through the stillness of this place
And let thy low breath move across my face,
As faint winds move above a poplar's crest.

The broad seas darken slowly in the west;
The wheeling sea-birds call from nest to nest;
Draw near and touch me, leaning out of space,
O happy Sleep!

There is no sorrow hidden or confess'd,
There is no passion uttered or suppress'd,
Thou canst not for a little while efface;
Enfold me in thy mystical embrace,

Thou sovereign gift of God, most sweet, most blest,
O happy Sleep!

Ada Louise Martin

THE GODS ARE DEAD

The gods are dead? Perhaps they are! Who knows?
Living at least in Lempriere undeleted,
The wise, the fair, the awful, the jocose,
Are one and all, I like to think, retreated
In some still land of lilacs and the rose.

Once high they sat, and high o'er earthy shows
With sacrificial dance and song were greeted,
Once

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long ago: but now the story goes,

The gods are dead.

It must be true. The world a world of prose,
Full-crammed with facts, in science swathed and

sheeted,

Nods in a stertorous after-dinner doze.

Plangent and sad, in every wind that blows
Who will may hear the sorry words repeated-
The gods are dead.

THE GATES OF HORN

W. E. Henley

The Gates of Horn are dull of hue
(If all our wise men tell us true).

No songs, they say, nor perfumed air
Shall greet the wistful pilgrim there,
No leaves are green, no skies are blue.

Yet he who will may find a clue
(Mid shadows steeped in opal dew)
To seek, and see them passing fair,
The Gates of Horn.

The man that goes not wreathed with rue,
Right lovely shapes his smile shall sue,
With red rose-garlands in their hair
And garments gay with gold and vair,
Full fain to meet him trooping through
The Gates of Horn.

Graham R. Tomson

WHAT IS TO COME

What is to come we know not. But we know
That what has been was good-was good to show,

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