A gentle boy, with soft and silken locks,
A dreamy boy, with brown and tender eyes,
A castle-builder, with his wooden blocks,
And towers that touch imaginary skies.
A fearless rider on his father's knee,
An eager listener unto stories told
At the Round Table of the nursery,
Of heroes and adventures manifold.
There will be other towers for thee to build;
There will be other steeds for thee to ride;
There will be other legends, and all filled
With greater marvels and more glorified.
Build on, and make thy castles high and fair,
Rising and reaching upward to the skies;
Listen to voices in the upper air,
Nor lose thy simple faith in mysteries.
Birds of Passage 1873
- Birds of Passage
- Prometheus, or the Poet's Forethought
- Epimetheus, or the Poet's Afterthought
- The Ladder of St. Augustine
- The Phantom Ship
- The Warden of the Cinque Ports
- Haunted Houses
- In the Churchyard at Cambridge
- The Emperor's Bird's-Nest
- The Two Angels
- Daylight and Moonlight
- The Jewish Cemetery at Newport
- Oliver Basselin
- Victor Galbraith
- My Lost Youth
- The Ropewalk
- The Golden Mile-Stone
- Catawba Wine
- Santa Filomena
- The Discoverer of the North Cape
- Daybreak
- The Fiftieth Birthday of Agassiz
- Children
- Sandalphon
- The Children's Hour
- Enceladus
- The Cumberland
- Snow-Flakes
- A Day of Sunshine
- Something Left Undone
- Weariness