• 2larcom’£ Books, POETICAL WORKS. Household Edition. With gilt, Portrait. i2mo, $1.50 ; full $2.00 POEMS. i6mo, $1.25. AN IDYL OF WORK. i6mo, $1.25. WILD ROSES OF CAPE ANN, AND OTHER POEMS. i6mo, gilt top, $1.25. CHILDHOOD SONGS. Illustrated. i2mo, £1.00. EASTER GLEAMS. Poems. i6mo, parchment paper, 75 cents. AS IT IS IN HEAVEN. i6mo, $1.00. AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE, and other Songs of Faith. i6mo, $1.00. THE UNSEEN FRIEND. i6mo, $i.co. A NEW ENGLAND GIRLHOOD, outlined from Memory. In Riverside Library for Young People. i6mo, 75 cents. Holiday Edition. i6mo, $1.25. BREATHINGS OF THE BETTER LIFE. Edited by Lucy Larcom. i8mo, $1.25. ROADSIDE POEMS FOR SUMMER TRAVELLERS. Selected by Lucy Larcom. i8mo, $1.00. HILLSIDE AND SEASIDE IN POETRY. Selected by Lucy Larcom. i8mo, $1.00. BECKONINGS FOR EVERY DAY. A Collection of Quotations for each day in the year. Compiled by Lucy Larcom. i6mo, $1.00. HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY, Boston and New York. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2016 https://archive.org/details/poeticalworksofl00larc_0 THE POETICAL WORKS OF LUCY LARCOM S?ou£fcl)olD Coition WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY (3Tfie <£amImD0e Copyright, 1868, 1874, 1875, and 1880, By FIELDS, OSGOOD & CO., JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO. AND LUCY LARCOM. Copyright, 1884, By LUCY LARCOM. All rights reserved. PS ,Pt The Riverside Press Cambridge Mass., U. S. A. , , Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Company. CONTENTS Surlier Poems. page Hannah binding Shoes . i Skipper Ben 2 Hilary 3 On the Beach 4 A Sea Glimpse 6 Peggy Bligh’s Voyage . 6 The Light-Houses 9 Bittersweet Shadows 10 The Legend of Skadi ....* n The Old School-House 13 Elsie in Illinois 14 My Mountain 17 Chocorua 18 Clouds on Whiteface 19 A Mountain Resurrection 19 Three Sonnets 20 The Distant Range. The Presence. The Farewell. At Winnipesaukee 21 Rock and Rill 23 The School-Mistress 23 Getting Along .... 23 Unwedded 26 Her Choice 28 By and By 29 Chriemhild 30 Legend of a Veil 32 Entangled 37 The Riddle of Beauty 38 Hints 39 Violets 42 Apple-Blossoms 42 The Death of June 43 The Indian Summer 45 Would You? 46 Better 47 The Rose Enthroned 48 Hand in Hand with Angels 50 Eureka 51 Psyche at School 52 Thirty-Five S3 Sleep-Song 56 So Little 37 IV CONTENTS. Three Old Saws 57 A Word with my Soul 58 The Weeping Prophet 59 Nature and the Book 61 The Long Prayer 62 Old Sabbath Days 64 A White Sunday 65 Sonnets 68 Drought. Springs in the Desert. The Secret 69 “ Himself He cannot Save” 69 Hymn 7 i “ As Strangers and Pilgrims ” 7i Monica and Augustine 72 A Thanksgiving . 74 Wish and Prayer 75 Burdened 76 Divine and Human 77 Our Prayers 77 At the Beautiful Gate 78 My Angel Dress 79 “ Follow Thou Me” 80 Thy Will be Done 81 The Still Hour 81 Heaven’s Need 82 The City Lights 83 The Chamber called Peace 84 A Year in Heaven 85 By the Fireside 86 Near Shore 88 Across the River 89 More Life go War Memories. The Nineteenth of April 92 The Sinking of the Merrimack . 93 Weaving 93 Waiting for News 95 A Loyal Woman’s No 98 Re-Enlisted 99 Canticle De Profundis 101 Lincoln’s Passing-Bell 103 The Flag 103 Verses for Occasions. Our Alumni 105 At Norton Again 108 Hymn ( Old South Church, Beverly ) 109 Hymn ( First Congregational Church, Lowell ) . no Hymn ( Old South Church, Boston ) III Garfield’s Burial Day III Two Festivals 1 12 Childhood Songs. To Prince Hal and Little Queen Maude . ”5 In Time’s Swing 115 Prince Hal 116 At Queen Maude’s Banquet . 118 Peepsy 118 In the Tree-Top 121 What shall we wrap the Baby in ? . 122 11 CONTENTS. V Moonshine 123 Snow-Song 123 The Wind-Flower 124 March 124 Red-Top and Timothy 125 Jack-in-the-Pulpit 126 Sir Robin 126 Gowns of Gossamer 127 Calling the Violet 128 Shower and Flower The Mystery of the Seed 130 Easter Dawn 13 Nature’s Easter-Music . 13 Farther On 133 The Rivulet 134 The Brown Thrush A Harebell 135 Pussy-Clover 136 Hal’s Birthday 137 Berrying Song 138 Happy Fields of Summer 138 Little Hugh 139 Nid-Nodding 140 Swinging on a Birch-Tree 140 Little Nannie 141 A Lily’s Word 142 Purple Sandwort 142 Rosebud 143 Grace and her Friends 144 The Brook that ran into the Sea 145 The Sing-Away Bird 146 The Magic Flower 147 Playthings 149 Flower-Girls 150 Swing Away 151 A Little Cavalier 15 A Face in the Tongs 153 A Little Old Girl 154 In Fairy-Land 155 If I were a Sunbeam 156 A Child’s Night-Thoughts 157 Starlight 158 The Last Flower of the Year 159 What the Train ran over 159 The Bam Window 161 Black in Blue Sky 162 A Roadside Preacher 163 Our Lady of the Lilies 164 “ Like any other Little Girl ” 166 The Country Boy 167 Snow Fancies 169 On the Stairway * 170 The Tambourine Girl 171 Little Bridget’s Country Week 172 A Christmas Thought 175 At Nightfall 175 Christmas Green 176 Winter 178 My Children 179 VI CONTENTS. /. Wild Roses of Cape Ann. Wild Roses of Cape Ann 181 The Little Brown Cabin . 183 My Mariner .... 183 At Georges’ . 185 The Old Hymns . 187 Rafe’s Chasm . 190 The Sea’s Bondmaid 192 On the Misery . 194 My Name-Aunt 197 A Strip of Blue . 198 The Lady Arbella 200 Sweet-Brier . 202 Mistress Hale of Beverly 203 Sylvia 206 Flower of Grass 209 Mehetabel 209 Fern-Life .... 211 Phebe 212 In the Air .... 214 Bessie and Ruth 214 Golden Daisies 216 Barberrying . 216 A Gambrel Roof . 218 Goody Grunsell’s House . 221 The Fog-Bell .... 223 Old Madeline . 224 They Said .... 226 Golden-Rod . 226 At her Bedside 228 Over the Hill .... 228 Workmates .... 229 The Water-Lily 231 My Merrimack 231 The Field-Sparrow . 232 October 233 When the Woods turn Brown . 234 November .... 235 A White World. 236 Snow-Bloom .... 237 Between Winter and Spring 238 Friend Brook 238 One Butterfly . 239 White Everlasting Flowers . 240 On the Ledge . 242 Up the Androscoggin 242 In a Cloud Rift .... 243 Mountaineer’s Prayer . 245 Asleep on the Summit . 24S . Shared 246 From the Hills .... 246 A Passing Sail 247 Bermoothes .... 247 The Sunset-Bird of Dominica 250 Sea and Sky .... 251 Horizon • . 251 R. W. E 253 J. G. W 254 O. W. H 254 CONTENTS. Vll Growing Old 254 A Prairie Nest 255 A Whisper of Memory 257 Through Minnehaha’s Veil . 258 In Vision 260 Need and Wish 261 Thriftless 261 No Loss . 262 What Cometh? 263 A Friend 263 My Fear 264 Come Home 265 Befriended 267 *F. W. R 268 Show me Thy way 269 The Heart of God 270 Indwelling 272 Praying Always 273 Christ the Light 27a A Stray Leaf 275 Not Pure, but Purified 273 Myra 276 Ye did it unto Me 279 Woman’s Easter 279 Why Life is Sweet 280 The True Witness 281 Daily Bread 282 My Cup runneth over 283 Our Christ 283 The Ladder of Angels 284 Winter Midnight . 285 Sea-Side Hymn 286 Drawing Nearer 286 His Birthday 288 Door and Keeper 289 Thy Kingdom Come 290 Immortal Years 290 Foretaste 292 Yet Onward 292 Later Poems. In the World with You ...... 294 The Trees 29S Flowers of the Fallow 296 By the River 297 A Song-Sparrow in March 298 Orion 298 Climbing to Rest 299 Mount Moriah from Bethel 299 The Summit-Flower 301 Looking Down 301 Valley and Peak 302 A Mountain Bridal 303 Hills in Mist 304 The Lily of the Resurrection 3°S Misread 306 In the Street 306 Beauty ever near 307 Abandoned 307 Thee Only 308 Vlll CONTENTS. In Whom We Live 308 The Inmost One Transfigured Woman's Christmas Glimpses Work in Heaven Immortal 315 The Proof 316 By Eden Streams 316 Elizabeth .. .. God Bless You! .318 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Lucy Larcom Frontispiece. “ Nahant’s long reach ” 6 “ Apple blossoms, budding, blowing ” 42 “ For the gold fringed clouds that curtain Heaven’s inner mystery ” 75 “ There ’s a giant with a scythe ” 125 “ And if his moaning waves can feel ” 146 Wild Roses of Cape Ann 181 Fern Life 212 The Water Lily . 231 Ralph Waldo Emerson 253 By the River 297 “ They bear me down to yon abysmal deep ” 301 EARLIER POEMS. HANNAH BINDING SHOES. Poor lone Hannah, Sitting at the window, binding shoes : Faded, wrinkled, Sitting, stitching, in a mournful muse. Bright-eyed beauty once was she, When the bloom was on the tree : Spring and winter, Hannah’s at the window, binding shoes. Not a neighbor, Passing nod or answer will refuse, To her whisper, 44 Is there from the fishers any news?” Oh, her heart’s adrift, with one On an endless voyage gone ! Night and morning, Hannah’s at the window, binding shoes. Fair young Hannah, Ben, the sunburnt fisher, gayly wooes: Hale and clever, For a willing heart and hand he sues. May-day skies are all aglow, And the waves are laughing so ! For her wedding Hannah leaves her window and her shoes. May is passing : Mid the apple boughs a pigeon cooes. Hannah shudders, For the mild southwester mischief brews. Round the rocks of Marblehead, Outward bound, a schooner sped: Silent, lonesome, Hannah ’s at the window, binding shoes. i ! : 2 EARLIER POEMS.