death, or soldier's wound, of country's loss or
     safety,
(O heaven! what flash and started endless train of all!
     compared indeed to that!
What wretched shred e'en at the best of all!)

1888 1888-9

AN EVENING LULL

AFTER a week of physical anguish,
Unrest and pain, and feverish heat,
Toward the ending day a calm and lull comes on,
Three hours of peace and soothing rest of brain.²

1888 1888-9

OLD AGE'S LAMBENT PEAKS

THE touch of flame
     — the illuminating fire — the loftiest look
     at last,
O'er city, passion, sea — o'er prairie, mountain,
     wood — the earth itself;
The airy, different, changing hues of all, in falling twilight,
Objects and groups, bearings, faces, reminiscences;

The calmer sight — the golden setting, clear and
     broad:
So much i' the atmosphere, the points of view, the
     situations whence we scan,
Bro't out by them alone — so much (perhaps the
     best) unreck'd before;
The lights indeed from them — old age's lambent
     peaks.

1888 1889

AFTER THE SUPPER AND TALK

AFTER the supper and talk — after the day is done,
As a friend from friends his final withdrawal prolonging,
Good- bye and Good-bye with emotional lips repeating,
(So hard for his hand to release those hands — no
     more will they meet,
No more for communion of sorrow and joy, of old and
     young,
A far-stretching journey awaits him, to return no more,)
Shunning, postponing severance — seeking to ward
     off the last word ever so little,
E'en at the exit-door turning — charges superfluous
     calling back — e'en as he descends the steps,
Something to eke out a minute additional —
     shadows of nightfall deepening,
Farewells, messages lessening — dimmer the
     forthgoer's visage and form,
Soon to be lost for aye in the darkness — loth,
     O so loth to depart!
Garrulous to the very last.

1887 1888-9