Beautiful Things - by Ellen P. Allerton 

Beautiful faces are those that wear-
It matters little if dark or fair-
Whole-souled honesty printed there.

Beautiful eyes are those that show,
Like crystal panes whee hearthfires glow,
Beautiful thoughts that burn below.

Beautiful lips are those whose words
Leap from the heart like songs of birds,
Yet whose utterance prudence girds.

Beautiful hands are those that do
Work that is honest and brave and true,
Moment by moment the long day through.

Beautiful feet are those that go
On kindly ministries to and fro,
Down lowliest ways, if God wills it so.

Beautiful shoulders are those that bear
Ceaseless burdens of homely care
With patient grace and daily prayer.

Beautiful lives are those that bless
Silent rivers of happiness,
Whose hidden fountains but few may guess.

Beautiful twilight at set of sun,
Beautiful goal with race well won,
Beautiful rest with work well done.

Beautiful graves where grasses creep,
Where brown leaves fall, where drifts lie deep
Over worn-out hands - oh! beautiful sleep!

The Bridgebuilder -
Will Allen Dromgoole (1860-1934)

Submitted by: Bob McComb

An old man, going a lone highway,
Came at the evening, cold and gray,
To chasm, vast and deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.
The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The sullen stream had no fears for him;
But he turned when safe on the other side
And built a bridge to span the tide.

'Old man,' said a fellow pilgrim near,
'You are wasting strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again must pass this way;
You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide --
Why build you the bridge at the eventide?'

The builder lifted his old gray head:
'Good friend, in the path I have come,' he said,
'There followeth after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pit-fall be,
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building the bridge for him.'

Chill of the Eve - by James Stephens

A long green swell
Slopes soft to the sea;
And a far-off bell
Swings sweet to me;
As the grey
Chill day
Slips away
From the lea.

Spread cold and far,
Without one glow
From a mild pale star,
Is the sky's steel bow;
And the grey
Chill day
Slips away
Below.

Yon green tree grieves
To the air around;
And the whispering leaves
Have a lonely sound;
As the grey
Chill day
Slips away
From the ground.

And dark, more dark,
The shades settle down;
Far off is a spark
From the lamp-lit town;
And the grey
Chill day
Slips away
With a frown.

The Clod and the Pebble - by William Blake

"Love seeketh not itself to please, 
Nor for itself hath any care,
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair."

So sung a little Clod of Clay
Trodden with the cattle's feet,
But a Pebble of the brook
Warbled out these metres meet:

"Love seeketh only self to please,
To bind another to its delight,
Joys in another's loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite." 

Death, Be Not Proud - by John Donne

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor death, not yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which yet thy pictures be,
Much pleasure, then from thee much more, must low
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones and soul's delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings and desperate men
And dost with poison, war and sickness dwell,
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

The Divine Image - by William Blake

To Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love 
All pray in their distress;
And to these virtues of delight
Return their thankfulness.

For Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love
Is God, our father dear,
And Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love
Is Man, his child and care.

For Mercy has a human heart,
Pity a human face,
And Love, the human form divine,
And Peace, the human dress.

Then every man, of every clime,
That prays in his distress,
Prays to the human form divine,
Love, Mercy, Pity, Peace.

And all must love the human form,
In heathen, Turk, or Jew;
Where Mercy, Love, and Pity dwell
There God is dwelling too. 

Do It Now - by Berton Braley

If with pleasure you are viewing 
any work a man is doing,
If you like him or you love him, 
tell him now;
Don't withhold your approbation 
till the parson makes oration
And he lies with snowy lilies on his brow;
No matter how you shout it 
he won't really care about it;
He won't know how many teardrops 
you have shed;
If you think some praise is due him 
now's the time to slip it to him,
For he cannot read his tombstone when he's dead.

More than fame and more than money 
is the comment kind and sunny
And the hearty, warm approval of a friend,.
For it gives to life a savor, 
and it makes you stronger, braver,
And it gives you heart and spirit to the end;
If he earns your praise - bestow it, 
if you like him let him know it,
Let the words of true encouragement be said;
Do not wait till life is over 
and he's underneath the clover,
For he cannot read his tombstone when he's dead.

A Dream - by Edgar Allan Poe

In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed -
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream - that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar -
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?

The Dream - by John Hollander

I run down the streets
Of dim houses, low,
Narrow and of few
Windows, looking down
Corners to find her.

There she stands under
An unlit street-lamp,
Smiling with someone
Else over what had
Been our own old joke.

Then I wake, moaning.
Why, O why?  All this
Need not have been a dream:
It is what I see
With my opened eye.

Why does sleep reveal
What the day has not
Hidden, as if it
Were a dark secret
My heart could not keep?

A Dream Within a Dream - by Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow -
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand -
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep - while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

The Fairies - by William Allingham

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren't go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk, 
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap, 
And white owl's feather!

Down along the rocky shore
Some make their home,
They live on crispy pancakes
Of yellow tidefoam;
Some in the reeds
Of the black mountain lake,
With frogs for their watch-dogs
All night awake.
High on the hill-top
The old King sits;
He is now so old and gray
He's nigh lost his wits.
With a bridge of white mist
Columbkill he crosses,
On his stately journeys
From Slieveleague to Rosses;
Or going up with music
On cold starry nights
To sup with the Queen
Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget
For seven years long;
When she came down again
Her friends were all gone;
They took her lightly back,
Between the night and morrow,
They thought that she was fast asleep
But she was dead with sorrow.
They have kept her ever since
Deep within the lake, 
On a bed of flagleaves
Watching till she wake.

By the craggy hill-side,
Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn-trees
For pleasure here and there.
If any man so daring
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In his bed at night.

Up the airy mountain, 
Down the rushy glen,
We daren't go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl's feather!

Fate - by Susan Marr Spalding

Two shall be born, the whole wide world apart,
And speak in different tongues and have no thought
Each of the other's being, and no heed;
And these, o'er unknown seas, to unknown lands
Shall cross, escaping wreck, defying death;
And all unconsciously shape every act
And bend each wandering step to this one end -
That one day out of darkness they shall meet
And read life's meaning in each other's eyes.

And two shall walk some narrow way of life
So nearly side by side that, should one turn
Ever so little space to left or right,
They needs must stand acknowledged, face to face,
And yet, with wistful eyes that never meet,
And groping hands that never clasp, and lips
Calling in vain to ears that never hear,
They seek each other all their weary days
And die unsatisfied - and this is Fate!

Forget Thee? - by John Moultrie

"Forget thee?"  If to dream by night 
and muse on thee by day,
If all the worship deep and wild 
a poet's heart can pay,
If prayers in absence breathed for thee 
to Heaven's protecting power,
If winged thoughts that flit to thee 
- a thousand in an hour -
If busy fancy blending thee 
with all my future lot -
If this thou call'st "forgetting," 
thou, indeed, shalt be forgot!

"Forget thee?"  Bid the forest-birds 
forget their sweetest tune;
"Forget thee?"  Bid the sea forget 
to swell beneath the moon;
Bid the thirsty flowers forget 
to drink the eve's refreshing dew;
Thyself forget thine own "dear land," 
and its "mountains wild and blue."
Forget each old familiar face, 
each long-remember'd spot -
When these things are forgot by thee, 
then thou shalt be forgot!

Keep, if thou wilt, thy maiden peace, 
still calm and fancy-free,
For God forbid thy gladsome heart 
should grow less glad for me;
Yet, while that heart is still unwon, 
oh! bid not mine to rove,
But let it nurse its humble faith 
and uncomplaining love;
If these, preserved for patient years, 
at last avail me not,
Forget me then; but ne'er believe 
that thou canst be forgot!