With a hey, Dolly! ho, Dolly! Before the spray is white with May, Let those who will be proud and chill ! With a hey, Dolly! ho, Dolly! Dolly shall be mine, Before the spray is white with May, Break, break to hear, O crocus-spear! And Dolly is her name. With a hey, Dolly! ho, Dolly! Dolly shall be mine, Before the spray is white with May, GE AN OLD FISH POND REEN growths of mosses drop and bead And 'twixt the isles of water-weed The wood-birds dip and drink. Slow efts about the edges sleep; Shoot on the surface; down the deep Look down. What groves that scarcely sway! Might choose his vantage-ground! Who knows what lurks beneath the tide?— Who knows what tale? Belike, Those "antres vast" and shadows hide Some patriarchal Pike;— Some tough old tyrant, wrinkle-jawed, Have but for aim to look on awed And see him wax in girth ; Hard ruler there by right of might; Whose "good old rule" is "Appetite, While they poor souls!-in wan despair When the pond's terror too must go; Some bolder brood, with common blow, Or say, perchance the liker this!- Still hungry, lingers on, With dwindling trunk and wolfish jaw Revolving sullen things, But most the blind unequal law The blot that makes the cosmic All Who knows! Meanwhile the mosses bead And 'twixt the isles of water-weed AN EASTERN APOLOGUE (TO E. H. P.) MELIK the Sultán, tired and wan, Nodded at noon on his diván. Beside the fountain lingered near Old Yusuf, sour and hard to please; Then JAMÍL sang, in words like these. Slim is Butheina-slim is she "Nay," quoth the other, teeth between, "Lean, if you will,-I call her lean." Sweet is Butheina-sweet as wine, "True, by the Prophet!" YUSUF said. "She makes men wander in the head!" |