Wooest not, nor vainly wranglest, But, looking fixedly the while, All my bounding heart entanglest In a golden-netted smile; Then in madness and in bliss, If my lips should dare to kiss Thy taper fingers amorously, Again thou blushest angerly; And o'er black brows drops down A sudden-curved frown. SONG. THE OWL. WHEN cats run home and light is come, And the whirring sail goes round, Alone and warming his five wits, When merry milkmaids click the latch, And rarely smells the new-mown hay, And the cock hath sung beneath the thatch Twice or thrice his roundelay, Twice or thrice his roundelay; Alone and warming his five wits, The white owl in the belfry sits. SECOND SONG. TO THE SAME. THY tuwhits are lulled, I wot, So took echo with delight, I would mock thy chaunt anew; Not a whit of thy tuwhoo, Thee to woo to thy tuwhit, Thee to woo to thy tuwhit, With a lengthened loud halloo, Tuwhoo, tuwhit, tuwhit, tuwhoo-0-0. RECOLLECTIONS OF THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 1. WHEN the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free . In the silken sail of infancy, The tide of time flowed back with me, The forward-flowing tide of time; And many a sheeny summer-morn, RECOLLECTIONS OF THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. II. Anight my shallop, rustling through The fragrant, glistening deeps, and clove By garden porches on the brim, III. Often, where clear-stemmed platans guard The outlet, did I turn away The boat-head down a broad canal From the main river sluiced, where all The sloping of the moon-lit sward Of braided blooms unmown, which crept A goodly place, a goodly time, 23 |