ON THE SHORE.

LOOK off, dear love, across the sallow sands,
And mark yon meeting of the sun and sea;
How long they kiss, in sight of all the lands!
Ah, longer, longer we.

Now in the sea's red vintage melts the sun
As Egypt's pearl dissolved in rosy wine,
And Cleopatra Night drinks all. 'Tis done!
Love, lay thy hand in mine.

Come forth, sweet stars, and comfort Heaven's

heart;

Glimmer, ye waves, round else unlighted sands; O Night, divorce our sun and sky apart—

Never our lips, our hands!

SIDNEY LANier.

A STRIP OF BLUE.

I Do not own an inch of land,
But all I see is mine,—

The orchard and the mowing-fields,
The lawns and gardens fine.
The winds my tax-collectors are,
They bring me tithes divine,—
Wild scents and subtle essences,
A tribute rare and free

And more magnificent than all,
My window keeps for me
A glimpse of blue immensity,-
A little strip of sea.

Richer am I than he who owns
Great fleets and argosies;
I have a share in every ship
Won by the inland breeze
To loiter on yon airy road
Above the apple-trees.

I freight them with my untold dreams,
Each bears my own picked crew;
And nobler cargoes wait for them
Than ever India knew,-

My ships that sail into the East
Across that outlet blue.

Sometimes they seem like living shapes,— The people of the sky,—

Guests in white raiment coming down

From Heaven, which is close by:

I call them by familiar names,

As one by one draws nigh,

So white, so light, so spirit-like,

From violet mists they bloom! The aching wastes of the unknown Are half reclaimed from gloom,

Since on life's hospitable sea

All souls find sailing-room.

The ocean grows a weariness

With nothing else in sight;

Its east and west, its north and south,
Spread out from morn to night:
We miss the warm, caressing shore,
Its brooding shade and light.
A part is greater than the whole;
By hints are mysteries told;
The fringes of eternity,-

God's sweeping garment-fold,
In that bright shred of glimmering sea,
I reach out for, and hold.

The sails, like flakes of roseate pearl,

Float in upon the mist;

The waves are broken precious stones,Sapphire and amethyst,

Washed from celestial basement walls
By suns unsetting kissed.

Out through the utmost gates of space,
Past where the gay stars drift,
To the widening Infinite, my soul

Glides on, a vessel swift;
Yet loses not her anchorage

In yonder azure rift.

Here sit I, as a little child;

The threshold of God's door
Is that clear band of chrysoprase ;
Now the vast temple floor,

The blinding glory of the dome
I bow my head before:
The universe, O God, is home,
In height or depth to me;
Yet here upon thy footstool green
Content am I to be;

Glad, when is opened to my need
Some sea-like glimpse of thee.

LUCY LARCOM.

TO HELEN.

HELEN, thy beauty is to me

Like those Nicean barks of yore,
That gently, o'er a perfumed sea,
The weary, wayworn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naïad airs have brought me home
To glory that was Greece,

And the grandeur that was Rome.

Lo! in yon brilliant window niche

How statue-like I see thee stand, The agate lamp within thy hand! Ah, Psyche, from the regions which Are Holy Land!

EDGAR ALLAN POE,

A BOY'S MOTHER.

My Mother she's so good to me,
Ef I was good as I could be,
I couldn't be as good-no, sir!—
Can't any boy be good as her!

She loves me when I'm glad er sad;
She loves me when I'm good er bad;
An', what's a funniest thing, she says
She loves me when she punishes.

I don't like her to punish me.—
That don't hurt,-but it hurts to see
Her cryin',-Then I cry; an' nen
We both cry, an' be good again.

She loves me when she cuts and sews
My little cloak an' Sund'y clothes;
An' when my Pa comes home to tea,
She loves him most as much as me.

She laughs an' tells him all I said,
An' grabs me up an' pats my head;
An' I hug her, an' hug my Pa
An' love him purt' nigh much as Ma.

JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY.