Hattie Howard

If all the sermons good men preach
And all the precepts that they teach
Were gathered into one
...

By helpful fingers taught to twine
Around its trellis, grew
A delicate and dainty vine;
The bursting bud, its blossom sign,
...

The salt of the earth--what a meaningful phrase
From the lips of the Saviour, and one that conveys
A sense of the need of a substance saline
...

Fair summer home peninsula,
Enriched by every breeze
From fragrant islands, wafted far
Across the sunny seas!
...

Sometimes I long to write an ode
And magnify his name,
The man of honor, on the road
To opulence and fame,
...

Midway upon the lawn it stands,
So picturesque and pretty;
Upreared by patient artist hands,
Admired of all the city;
...

Of all the lovely blossoms
That decorate the trees,
And shower down their petals
With every breath of breeze,
...

Around my vine-wreathed portico,
At evening, there's a perfect glow
Of little lights a-flashing--
As if the stellar bodies had
...

November? 'tis a summer's day!
For tropic airs are blowing
As soft as whispered roundelay
From unseen lips that seem to say
...

I saw her for a moment,
Her presence haunts me yet,
In oft-recurring visions
Of grace and gladness met
...

One summer time, with love imbued,
To climb the mount, explore the wood,
Or rove from pole to pole,
Upon Monadnock's brow I stood--
...

Subdued and sad, I trod the place
Where he, the hero, lived and died;
Where, long-entombed beneath the shade
By willow bough and cypress made,
...

My head is aching, and I wish
That I could feel tonight
One well-remembered, tender touch
That used to comfort me so much,
...

The morning sun rose bright and fair
Upon a lovely village where
Prosperity abounded,
And ceaseless hum of industry
...

Fresh from piano, school, and books,
A happy girl with rosy looks
Young Plowman wooed and won; despite
Her pretty, pouting prejudice,
...

They are not gone whose lives in beauty so unfolding
Have left their own sweet impress everywhere;
Like flowers, while we linger in beholding,
...

We look up to the stars tonight,
Idolatrous of them,
And dream that Heaven is in sight,
And each a ray of purest light
...

On Bancroft height Aurora's face
Shines brighter than a star,
As stepping forth in dewy grace,
The gates of day unbar;
...

We met on 'Boston Common'--
Of course it was by chance--
A sudden, unexpected,
But happy circumstance
...

'Twas on a day of cold and sleet,
A little nomad of the street
With tattered garments, shoeless feet,
And face with hunger wan,
...