Oh! might I praise your beauty as I would
With splendors of the high, impassioned pen
That, at a touch, transmits the salient good,
And, to the spirit, makes it live again!
So Dante wrote of Beatrice divine,
So Petrarch wrote of Laura, and so he,
Shakespeare, made even more real Rosaline,
Miranda, Juliet, Hermione.
Had I the gifts the master poets had,
I should compose a ring of golden verse
And in it set you, Diamond,—all too glad
Such jeweler to be,—and thus rehearse
To the whole world, and for all time renew,
The excellence that sways me and is you.
WHAT DO WE PLANT?
What do we plant when we plant the tree?
We plant the ship, which will cross the sea.
We plant the mast to carry the sails;
We plant the planks to withstand the gales—
The keel, the keelson, and beam and knee;
We plant the ship when we plant the tree.
What do we plant when we plant the tree?
We plant the houses for you and me.
We plant the rafters, the shingles, the floors,
We plant the studding, the lath, the doors,
The beams and siding, all parts that be;
We plant the house when we plant the tree.
What do we plant when we plant the tree?
A thousand things that we daily see;
We plant the spire that out-towers the crag,
We plant the staff for our country's flag,
We plant the shade, from the hot sun free;
We plant all these when we plant the tree.
