the heaving nights,
The sharp mosquito flaps his wings,
And bites;

With other Anthropophagi,
Such as that microscopic brand
The common Sand-fly (or the fly
Of sand),

Who, with a hideous lust uncurbed
By clappings of the frequent palm,
Devours one's ankles, undisturbed,
And calm.

The scorpion nips one unaware:
The lizard flops upon the head:
And cobras, uninvited, share
One's bed.

Oh, if I only had the luck
To feel the grand Olympic fire
That thrilled the Greater when they struck
The lyre!

When Homer wrote of this and that:
When Dante sang like one possessed:
When Milton groaned and laboured at
His Best!

Had I the swelling rise and fall,
Whereof the Bo'sun's quivering moan
Derives a breezy fragrance all
Its own:

Oh, I would pour such passion out--
Good gracious me!--I would so sing
That you should know the _facts_ about
This thing!

Then w-w-wake, my Lyre! O halting lilt!
O miserable, broken lay!
It may not be: I am not built
That way.

Yet other gifts the gods bestow.
I do not weep, I do not grieve.
Far from it. I shall simply go
On leave.

ELYSIUM

From the dust, and the drought, and the heat,
I am borne on the pinions of leave,
From the things that are bad to repeat
To the things that are good to receive.

From the glare of the day at its height
On a land that was blinding to see,
From the wearisome hiss of the night,
By a turn of the wheel I am free.

I have passed to the heart of the Hills,
For a season of halcyon hours,
'Mid the music of murmurous rills,
And the delicate odours of flowers;

And I walk in an exquisite shade,
Where the fern-tasselled boughs interlace;
And the verdurous fringe of the glade
Is a marvel of fairylike grace;

And with never an aim or a plan
I can wander in uttermost ease,
Where the only reminders of Man
Are the monkeys aloft in the trees;

Or, perchance, on the 'silvery mere,'
In a 'shallop' I lazily float,
With--it's possible--some one to steer,
Or with no one (which lightens the boat).