Thomas Bailey Aldrich
1836
to
1907
First Lines of Thomas Bailey Aldrich
A certain bird in a certain wood, A glance, a word -- and joy or pain A little mound with chipped headstone, A poor dwarf's figure, looming through the dense Black tragedy lets slip her grim disguise Bonnet in hand, obsequious and discreet, Day is a snow-white Dove of heaven Ere the moon begins to rise Faint murmurs from the pine-tops reach my ear, Fixed to her necklace, like another gem, Gifts they sent her manifold, Great thoughts in crude, inadequate verse set forth, Herewith I send you three pressed withered flowers: High in a tower she sings, Honest Iago." When his breath was fled I gave my heart its freedom to be gay I little read those poets who have made If my best wines mislike thy taste, Imp of Dreams, when she's asleep, In their dark House of Cloud In youth my hair was black as night, Let art be all in all," one time I said, Let us keep him warm, Manoah's son, in his blind rage malign, No bird has ever uttered note No slightest golden rhyme he wrote No wonder Sajib wrote such verses, when Now is that sad time of year October turned my maple's leaves to gold; Or light or dark, or short or tall, See where at intervals the firefly's spark So closely knit are mind and brain, Such kings of shreds have wooed and won her, The big-lipped Sphinx, with bent perplexed brow, The face that Carlo Dolci drew The fault's not mine, you understand: This one sits shivering in Fortune's smile, To him that hath, we are told, Touched with the delicate green of early May, Up from the dark the moon begins to creep; We often fail by searching far and wide What mortal knows When friends are at your hearthside met, When from the tense chords of that mighty lyre When I was young and light of heart Wide open and unguarded stand our gates,