My hand, a little raised, might pr… Where I may look, the frosted pea… So shaped before Olympus was begu… Spanned each to each, now, by a si… Thus to face Beauty have I travel…

I. The Minor Poet His little trills and chirpings we… No music like the nightingale’s wa… Within his throat; but he, too, la… Upon a thorn.

I dunno yer highfalutin’ words, bu… When I’m peekin’ out th’ winder o… I’ve been lookin’ 'roun’ this big… An’ I want t’ tell ye, neighbor m… I’ve ben settin’ here, a-thinkin’…

And now I have another lad! No longer need you tell How all my nights are slow and sad For loving you too well. His ways are not your wicked ways,

Oh, ponder, friend, the porcupine; Refresh your recollection, And sit a moment, to define His means of self-protection. How truly fortified is he!

Joy stayed with me a night— Young and free and fair— And in the morning light He left me there. Then Sorrow came to stay,

Carlyle combined the lit’ry life With throwing teacups at his wife, Remarking, rather testily, “Oh, stop your dodging, Mrs. C.!”

Once, when I was young and true, Someone left me sad– Broke my brittle heart in two; And that is very bad. Love is for unlucky folk,

Oh, both my shoes are shiny new, And pristine is my hat; My dress is 1922.... My life is all like that.

If I were mild, and I were sweet, And laid my heart before your feet… And took my dearest thoughts to yo… And hailed your easy lies as true; Were I to murmur “Yes,” and then

Unseemly are the open eyes That watch the midnight sheep, That look upon the secret skies Nor close, abashed, in sleep; That see the dawn drag in, unbidde…

Authors and actors and artists and… Never know nothing, and never know… Sculptors and singers and those of… Tell their affairs from Seattle t… Playwrights and poets and such hor…

Half across the world from me Lie the lands I’ll never see– I, whose longing lives and dies Where a ship has sailed away; I, that never close my eyes

For one, the amaryllis and the ros… The poppy, sweet as never lilies a… The ripen’d vine, that beckons as… The dancing star. For one, the trodden rosemary and…

She that begs a little boon (Heel and toe! Heel and toe!) Little gets– and nothing, soon. (No, no, no! No, no, no!) She that calls for costly things