Joseph Skipsey Poems

UNKNIT that brow; the day too soon
Departs when starry nights are nearer;
They're clouded now, nor will the Moon
Once come and try to make them clearer.
...

SHE snapt her fingers, on her heel,
Her sweet boot-heel, she turned and left me;
What did I feel?—What could I feel,
At what of paradise had reft me?
...

CAN this be her? Her dark eyes show
Two planets in the midnight heaven;
Her cheeks the blood-dyed rose—her brow
The snow upon the mountains driven;
...

'You wont!' the Rose's accents ring;
'I will!' the Golden Bee's are ringing;
And tho' the winds, to aid her, spring,
Soon with the breeze-tost bloom he's
...

'You naughty Bee!' the Red Rose said;
'To come at noon by Envy driven,
And wound the bloom whose beauty made
The Sun to linger in the heaven!
...

'ADIEU!' she cried, and with that cry
Adown the star-lit valley fleeted,
And Echo from her tower on high,
With cruel tongue, the word repeated.
...

AH, deem not when thy minstrel tunes
His harp to hours and glories vanished,
His star of stars, his moon of moons,
Can ever from his heart be banish'd.
...

THEY cry, 'How light the heart and bright,
From which proceed such strains of
gladness!'
They can't discern the pangs that burn,
...

THE rogue, she smiled, then swept away,
Her raven locks behind her streaming;
My very pulse forgot to play,
And I was left in wonder dreaming.
...

SHE took the wood thro' which she sung,
But in the lake near which she wended,
An image met, and swayed and swung,
And three times with her image blended.
...