[ { "title": "The Old Man Dreams", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "OH for one hour of youthful joy!", "Give back my twentieth spring!", "I'd rather laugh, a bright-haired boy,", "Than reign, a gray-beard king.", "", "Off with the spoils of wrinkled age!", "Away with Learning's crown!", "Tear out life's Wisdom-written page,", "And dash its trophies down!", "", "One moment let my life-blood stream", "From boyhood's fount of flame!", "Give me one giddy, reeling dream", "Of life all love and fame!", "", ". . . . .", "", "My listening angel heard the prayer,", "And, calmly smiling, said,", "\"If I but touch thy silvered hair", "Thy hasty wish hath sped.", "", "\"But is there nothing in thy track,", "To bid thee fondly stay,", "While the swift seasons hurry back", "To find the wished-for day?\"", "", "\"Ah, truest soul of womankind!", "Without thee what were life ?", "One bliss I cannot leave behind:", "I'll take-- my-- precious-- wife!\"", "", "The angel took a sapphire pen", "And wrote in rainbow dew,", "The man would be a boy again,", "And be a husband too!", "", "\"And is there nothing yet unsaid,", "Before the change appears?", "Remember, all their gifts have fled", "With those dissolving years.\"", "", "\"Why, yes;\" for memory would recall", "My fond paternal joys;", "\"I could not bear to leave them all--", "I'll take-- my-- girl-- and-- boys.\"", "", "The smiling angel dropped his pen,--", "\"Why, this will never do;", "The man would be a boy again,", "And be a father too!\"", "", ". . . . .", "", "And so I laughed,-- my laughter woke", "The household with its noise,--", "And wrote my dream, when morning broke,", "To please the gray-haired boys." ], "linecount": "46" }, { "title": "The Height of the Ridiculous", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "I WROTE some lines once on a time", "In wondrous merry mood,", "And thought, as usual, men would say", "They were exceeding good.", "", "They were so queer, so very queer,", "I laughed as I would die;", "Albeit, in the general way,", "A sober man am I.", "", "I called my servant, and he came;", "How kind it was of him", "To mind a slender man like me,", "He of the mighty limb.", "", "\"These to the printer,\" I exclaimed,", "And, in my humorous way,", "I added, (as a trifling jest,)", "\"There'll be the devil to pay.\"", "", "He took the paper, and I watched,", "And saw him peep within;", "At the first line he read, his face", "Was all upon the grin.", "", "He read the next; the grin grew broad,", "And shot from ear to ear;", "He read the third; a chuckling noise", "I now began to hear.", "", "The fourth; he broke into a roar;", "The fifth; his waistband split;", "The sixth; he burst five buttons off,", "And tumbled in a fit.", "", "Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye,", "I watched that wretched man,", "And since, I never dare to write", "As funny as I can." ], "linecount": "32" }, { "title": "Brother Jonathan's Lament", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "SHE has gone,-- she has left us in passion and pride,--", "Our stormy-browed sister, so long at our side!", "She has torn her own star from our firmament's glow,", "And turned on her brother the face of a foe!", "", "Oh, Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,", "We can never forget that our hearts have been one,--", "Our foreheads both sprinkled in Liberty's name,", "From the fountain of blood with the finger of flame!", "", "You were always too ready to fire at a touch;", "But we said, \"She is hasty,-- she does not mean much.\"", "We have scowled, when you uttered some turbulent threat;", "But Friendship still whispered, \"Forgive and forget!\"", "", "Has our love all died out? Have its altars grown cold?", "Has the curse come at last which the fathers foretold?", "Then Nature must teach us the strength of the chain", "That her petulant children would sever in vain.", "", "They may fight till the buzzards are gorged with their spoil,", "Till the harvest grows black as it rots in the soil,", "Till the wolves and the catamounts troop from their caves,", "And the shark tracks the pirate, the lord of the waves:", "", "In vain is the strife! When its fury is past,", "Their fortunes must flow in one channel at last,", "As the torrents that rush from the mountains of snow", "Roll mingled in peace through the valleys below.", "", "Our Union is river, lake, ocean, and sky:", "Man breaks not the medal, when God cuts the die!", "Though darkened with sulphur, though cloven with steel,", "The blue arch will brighten, the waters will heal!", "", "Oh, Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,", "There are battles with Fate that can never be won!", "The star-flowering banner must never be furled,", "For its blossoms of light are the hope of the world!", "", "Go, then, our rash sister! afar and aloof,", "Run wild in the sunshine away from our roof;", "But when your heart aches and your feet have grown sore,", "Remember the pathway that leads to our door!" ], "linecount": "36" }, { "title": "A Parody on “A Psalm of Life”", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "Life is real, life is earnest,", "And the shell is not its pen –", "“Egg thou art, and egg remainest”", "Was not spoken of the hen.", "", "Art is long and Time is fleeting,", "Be our bills then sharpened well,", "And not like muffled drums be beating", "On the inside of the shell.", "", "In the world’s broad field of battle,", "In the great barnyard of life,", "Be not like those lazy cattle!", "Be a rooster in the strife!", "", "Lives of roosters all remind us,", "We can make our lives sublime,", "And when roasted, leave behind us,", "Hen tracks on the sands of time.", "", "Hen tracks that perhaps another", "Chicken drooping in the rain,", "Some forlorn and henpecked brother,", "When he sees, shall crow again." ], "linecount": "20" }, { "title": "Bill and Joe", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "COME, dear old comrade, you and I", "Will steal an hour from days gone by,", "The shining days when life was new,", "And all was bright with morning dew,", "The lusty days of long ago,", "When you were Bill and I was Joe.", "", "Your name may flaunt a titled trail", "Proud as a cockerel's rainbow tail,", "And mine as brief appendix wear", "As Tam O'Shanter's luckless mare;", "To-day, old friend, remember still", "That I am Joe and you are Bill.", "", "You've won the great world's envied prize,", "And grand you look in people's eyes,", "With H O N. and L L. D.", "In big brave letters, fair to see,--", "Your fist, old fellow! off they go!--", "How are you, Bill? How are you, Joe?", "", "You've worn the judge's ermined robe;", "You've taught your name to half the globe;", "You've sung mankind a deathless strain;", "You've made the dead past live again:", "The world may call you what it will,", "But you and I are Joe and Bill.", "", "The chaffing young folks stare and say", "\"See those old buffers, bent and gray,--", "They talk like fellows in their teens", "Mad, poor old boys! That's what it means,\"--", "And shake their heads; they little know", "The throbbing hearts of Bill and Joe!--", "", "How Bill forgets his hour of pride,", "While Joe sits smiling at his side;", "How Joe, in spite of time's disguise,", "Finds the old schoolmate in his eyes,--", "Those calm, stern eyes that melt and fill", "As Joe looks fondly up at Bill.", "", "Ah, pensive scholar, what is fame?", "A fitful tongue of leaping flame;", "A giddy whirlwind's fickle gust,", "That lifts a pinch of mortal dust;", "A few swift years, and who can show", "Which dust was Bill and which was Joe?", "", "The weary idol takes his stand,", "Holds out his bruised and aching hand,", "While gaping thousands come and go,--", "How vain it seems, this empty show!", "Till all at once his pulses thrill;--", "'T is poor old Joe's \"God bless you, Bill!\"", "", "And shall we breathe in happier spheres", "The names that pleased our mortal ears;", "In some sweet lull of harp and song", "For earth-born spirits none too long,", "Just whispering of the world below", "Where this was Bill and that was Joe?", "", "No matter; while our home is here", "No sounding name is half so dear;", "When fades at length our lingering day,", "Who cares what pompous tombstones say?", "Read on the hearts that love us still,", "Hic jacet Joe. Hic jacet Bill." ], "linecount": "60" }, { "title": "Dorothy Q.", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "GRANDMOTHER's mother: her age, I guess,", "Thirteen summers, or something less;", "Girlish bust, but womanly air;", "Smooth, square forehead with uprolled hair;", "Lips that lover has never kissed;", "Taper fingers and slender wrist;", "Hanging sleeves of stiff brocade;", "So they painted the little maid.", "", "On her hand a parrot green", "Sits unmoving and broods serene.", "Hold up the canvas full in view,--", "Look! there's a rent the light shines through,", "Dark with a century's fringe of dust,--", "That was a Red-Coat's rapier-thrust!", "Such is the tale the lady old,", "Dorothy's daughter's daughter, told.", "", "Who the painter was none may tell,--", "One whose best was not over well;", "Hard and dry, it must be confessed,", "Fist as a rose that has long been pressed;", "Yet in her cheek the hues are bright,", "Dainty colors of red and white,", "And in her slender shape are seen", "Hint and promise of stately mien.", "", "Look not on her with eyes of scorn,--", "Dorothy Q. was a lady born!", "Ay! since the galloping Normans came,", "England's annals have known her name;", "And still to the three-hilled rebel town", "Dear is that ancient name's renown,", "For many a civic wreath they won,", "The youthful sire and the gray-haired son.", "", "O Damsel Dorothy! Dorothy Q.!", "Strange is the gift that I owe to you;", "Such a gift as never a king", "Save to daughter or son might bring,--", "All my tenure of heart and hand,", "All my title to house and land;", "Mother and sister and child and wife", "And joy and sorrow and death and life!", "What if a hundred years ago", "Those close-shut lips had answered NO,", "When forth the tremulous question came", "That cost the maiden her Norman name,", "And under the folds that look so still", "The bodice swelled with the bosom's thrill?", "Should I be I, or would it be", "One tenth another, to nine tenths me?", "", "Soft is the breath of a maiden's YES:", "Not the light gossamer stirs with less;", "But never a cable that holds so fast", "Through all the battles of wave and blast,", "And never an echo of speech or song", "That lives in the babbling air so long!", "There were tones in the voice that whispered then", "You may hear to-day in a hundred men.", "", "O lady and lover, how faint and far", "Your images hover,-- and here we are,", "Solid and stirring in flesh and bone,--", "Edward's and Dorothy's-- all their own,--", "A goodly record for Time to show", "Of a syllable spoken so long ago!--", "Shall I bless you, Dorothy, or forgive", "For the tender whisper that bade me live?", "", "It shall be a blessing, my little maid!", "I will heal the stab of the Red-Coat's blade,", "And freshen the gold of the tarnished frame,", "And gild with a rhyme your household name;", "So you shall smile on us brave and bright", "As first you greeted the morning's light,", "And live untroubled by woes and fears", "Through a second youth of a hundred years." ], "linecount": "72" }, { "title": "The Flower of Liberty", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "WHAT flower is this that greets the morn,", "Its hues from Heaven so freshly born?", "With burning star and flaming band", "It kindles all the sunset land:", "Oh tell us what its name may be,--", "Is this the Flower of Liberty?", "", "It is the banner of the free,", "The starry Flower of Liberty!", "", "In savage Nature's far abode", "Its tender seed our fathers sowed;", "The storm-winds rocked its swelling bud,", "Its opening leaves were streaked with blood,", "Till lo! earth's tyrants shook to see", "The full-blown Flower of Liberty!", "", "Then hail the banner of the free,", "The starry Flower of Liberty!", "", "Behold its streaming rays unite,", "One mingling flood of braided light,--", "The red that fires the Southern rose,", "With spotless white from Northern snows,", "And, spangled o'er its azure, see", "The sister Stars of Liberty!", "", "Then hail the banner of the free,", "The starry Flower of Liberty!", "", "The blades of heroes fence it round,", "Where'er it springs is holy ground;", "From tower and dome its glories spread;", "It waves where lonely sentries tread;", "It makes the land as ocean free,", "And plants an empire on the sea!", "", "Then hail the banner of the free,", "The starry Flower of Liberty!", "", "Thy sacred leaves, fair Freedom's flower,", "Shall ever float on dome and tower,", "To all their heavenly colors true,", "In blackening frost or crimson dew,--", "And God love us as we love thee,", "Thrice holy Flower of Liberty!", "", "Then hail the banner of the free,", "The starry FLOWER OF LIBERTY!" ], "linecount": "40" }, { "title": "A Farewell to Agassiz", "author": "Oliver Wendell Holmes", "lines": [ "How the mountains talked together,", "Looking down upon the weather,", "When they heard our friend had planned his", "Little trip among the Andes", "How they'll bare their snowy scalps", "To the climber of the Alps", "When the cry goes through their passes,", "\"Here comes the great Agassiz!\"", "\"Yes, I'm tall,\" says Chimborazo,", "\"But I wait for him to say so,--", "That's the only thing that lacks,-- he", "Must see me, Cotopaxi!\"", "\"Ay! ay!\" the fire-peak thunders,", "\"And he must view my wonders", "I'm but a lonely crater", "Till I have him for spectator!\"", "The mountain hearts are yearning,", "The lava-torches burning,", "The rivers bend to meet him,", "The forests bow to greet him,", "It thrills the spinal column", "Of fossil fishes solemn,", "And glaciers crawl the faster", "To the feet of their old master!", "Heaven keep him well and hearty,", "Both him and all his party!", "From the sun that broils and smites,", "From the centipede that bites,", "From the hail-storm and the thunder,", "From the vampire and the condor,", "From the gust upon the river,", "From the sudden earthquake shiver,", "From the trip of mule or donkey,", "From the midnight howling monkey,", "From the stroke of knife or dagger,", "From the puma and the jaguar,", "From the horrid boa-constrictor", "That has scared us in the picture,", "From the Indians of the Pampas", "Who would dine upon their grampas,", "From every beast and vermin", "That to think of sets us squirmin',", "From every snake that tries on", "The traveller his p'ison,", "From every pest of Natur',", "Likewise the alligator,", "And from two things left behind him,", "(Be sure they'll try to find him,)", "The tax-bill and assessor,--", "Heaven keep the great Professor!", "May he find, with his apostles,", "That the land is full of fossils,", "That the waters swarm with fishes", "Shaped according to his wishes,", "That every pool is fertile", "In fancy kinds of turtle,", "New birds around him singing,", "New insects, never stinging,", "With a million novel data", "About the articulata,", "And facts that strip off all husks", "From the history of mollusks.", "", "And when, with loud Te Deum,", "He returns to his Museum", "May he find the monstrous reptile", "That so long the land has kept ill", "By Grant and Sherman throttled,", "And by Father Abraham bottled,", "(All specked and streaked and mottled", "With the scars of murderous battles,", "Where he clashed the iron rattles", "That gods and men he shook at,)", "For all the world to look at!", "God bless the great Professor!", "And Madam, too, God bless her!", "Bless him and all his band,", "On the sea and on the land,", "Bless them head and heart and hand,", "Till their glorious raid is o'er,", "And they touch our ransomed shore!", "Then the welcome of a nation,", "With its shout of exultation,", "Shall awake the dumb creation,", "And the shapes of buried aeons", "Join the living creature's paeans,", "Till the fossil echoes roar;", "While the mighty megalosaurus", "Leads the palaeozoic chorus,", "God bless the great Professor,", "And the land his proud possessor,--", "Bless them now and evermore!" ], "linecount": "91" } ]