Walter Learned

HER lips were so near
That--what else could I do?
You'll be angry, I fear,
But her lips were so near--…

When blushing cheeks and downcast eyes
Set all the heart aflame,
When love within a dimple lies
And constancy's a name,…

When I was ten and she fifteen--
Ah, me! how fair I thought her.
She treated with disdainful mien
The homage that I brought her,…

WHEN I was seventeen I heard
From each censorious tongue,
"I'd not do that if I were you;
You see you're rather young."Now that I number forty years,…

Sullen and dull, in the September day,
On the bank of the river,
They waited the boat that should bear them away
From their poor homes forever.For progress strides on, and the order had gone…

At Cato's Head in Russell Street
These leaves she sat a-stitching;
I fancy she was trim and neat,
Blue-eyed and quite bewitching.Before her on the street below,…

Just as I thought I was growing old,
Ready to sit in my easy chair,
To watch the world with a heart grown cold,
And smile at a folly I would not share,Rose came by with a smile for me,…

THe robin plucks the berry red,
And tastes its spicy flavor;
The dainty bee, the flowerlet wooes,
And sips its honeyed favor.'Tis Nature's universal law…

Семнадцать лет мне было, и вокруг
Мне люди повторяли наставительно:
«Еще ты молод; будь скромнее, друг:
Твоя нескромность – просто возмутительна!»И вот уже мне сорок, и опять…

The promise of these fragrant flowers,
The fruit that 'neath these blossoms lies
Once hung, they say, in Eden's bowers,
And tempted Eve in Paradise.O fairest daughter of Eve's blood,…

You say, when I kissed you, you are sure I must quite
Have forgotten myself. So I did; you are right.
No, I'm not such an egotist, dear, it is true,
As to think of myself when I'm looking at you.

It is not here I best enjoy
The pleasure, that can never cloy,
Of idly roaming London town,
Where such familiar names look down…

With pen and ink one might indite
A sonnet, or indeed might write
A billet-doux, or, eke to raise
The wind, a note for thirty days.Not mine the poem; they'd send it back…

"Twas as she slept that Cupid came,
His bow and arrows taking,
That she might feel his power in dreams
Who scorned his weapons waking.As o'er her sleeping form he paused…

TO you, whose temperate pulses flow
With measured beat, serene and slow,
The even tenor of whose way
Is undisturbed by passion's sway,…