Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes Volume II.

Excerpt

SLEEPYHEAD

As I lay awake in the white moonlight,
I heard a faint singing in the wood,
      "Out of bed,
      Sleepyhead,
    Put your white foot, now;
      Here are we
      Beneath the tree
    Singing round the root now."

I looked out of window, in the white moonlight,
The leaves were like snow in the wood—
      "Come away,
      Child, and play
    Light with the gnomies;
      In a mound,
      Green and round,
    That's where their home is."

      "Honey sweet,
      Curds to eat,
    Cream and frumenty,
      Shells and beads,
      Poppy seeds,
    You shall have plenty."

But, as soon as I stooped in the dim moonlight
  To put on my stocking and my shoe,
The sweet shrill singing echoed faintly away,
  And the grey of the morning peeped through,
And instead of the gnomies there came a red robin
  To sing of the buttercups and dew.

Where the bluebells and the wind are,
    Fairies in a ring I spied,
And I heard a little linnet
    Singing near beside.

Where the primrose and the dew are—
    Soon were sped the fairies all:
Only now the green turf freshens,
    And the linnets call.

LOVELOCKS

I watched the Lady Caroline
Bind up her dark and beauteous hair;
Her face was rosy in the glass,
And 'twixt the coils her hands would pass,
    White in the candleshine.

Her bottles on the table lay,
Stoppered, yet sweet of violet;
Her image in the mirror stooped
To view those locks as lightly looped
    As cherry boughs in May.

The snowy night lay dim without,
I heard the Waits their sweet song sing;
The window smouldered keen with frost;
Yet still she twisted, sleeked and tossed
    Her beauteous hair about.

If I were Lord of Tartary,
  Myself and me alone,
My bed should be of ivory,
  Of beaten gold my throne;
And in my court would peacocks flaunt,
And in my forests tigers haunt,
And in my pools great fishes slant
  Their fins athwart the sun.

If I were Lord of Tartary,
  Trumpeters every day
To every meal should summon me,
  And in my courtyard bray;
And in the evening lamps would shine,
Yellow as honey, red as wine,
While harp, and flute, and mandoline,
  Made music sweet and gay.

If I were Lord of Tartary,
  I'd wear a robe of beads,
White, and gold, and green they'd be—
  And clustered thick as seeds;
And ere should wane the morning-star,
I'd don my robe and scimitar,
And zebras seven should draw my car
  Through Tartary's dark glades.

Lord of the fruits of Tartary,
  Her rivers silver-pale!
Lord of the hills of Tartary,
  Glen, thicket, wood, and dale!
Her flashing stars, her scented breeze,
Her trembling lakes, like foamless seas,
Her bird-delighting citron-trees
  In every purple vale!

THE BUCKLE

I had a silver buckle,
  I sewed it on my shoe,
And 'neath a sprig of mistletoe
  I danced the evening through.

I had a bunch of cowslips,
  I hid them in a grot,
In case the elves should come by night
  And me remember not....