IN midst of wide green pasture-lands, cut through
By lines of alders bordering deep-banked streams,
Where bulrushes and yellow iris grew,
And rest and peace, and all the flowers of dreams,
The Abbey stood--so still, it seemed a part
Of the marsh-country's almost pulseless heart.

The Torch

© Walt Whitman

ON my northwest coast in the midst of the night, a fishermen's group
stands watching;
Out on the lake, that expands before them, others are spearing
salmon;
The canoe, a dim shadowy thing, moves across the black water,
Bearing a Torch a-blaze at the prow.

The Test

© Robert Laurence Binyon

Now no man's loss is private: all share all.
Oh, each of us a soldier stands to--day,
Put to the proof and summoned to the call;
One will, one faith, one peril. Hearts, be high,
Most in the hour that's darkest! Come what may,
The soul in us is found, and shall not die.

The Manor Garden

© Sylvia Plath

The fountains are dry and the roses over.
Incense of death. Your day approaches.
The pears fatten like little buddhas.
A blue mist is dragging the lake.

The Prairie

© John Hay

The skies are blue above my head,

The prairie green below,

The Age of Wisdom

© William Makepeace Thackeray

Ho! pretty page, with the dimpled chin,
That never has known the Barber's shear,
All your wish is woman to win;
This is the way that boys begin-
Wait till you come to Forty Year.

The Wood-Cutter

We came behind him by the wall,
My brethren drew their brands,
And they had strength to strike him down--
And I to bind his hands.

The Ruined Homestead

White birds, frightened from silver grass,
whose blood-rose breasts and wings are thrown
like petals settling down the pass,
flower the ruined homesteads stone.