Thomas Bailey Aldrich

These Winter nights against my window-pane
Nature with busy pencil draws designs
Of ferns and blossoms and read more

These Winter nights against my window-pane
Nature with busy pencil draws designs
Of ferns and blossoms and fine spray of pines,
Oak-leaf and acorn and fantastic vines,
Which she will make when summer comes again--
Quaint arabesques in argent, flat and cold,
Like curious Chinese etchings.

Or light or dark, or short or tall,
She sets a springe to snare them all:
All's read more

Or light or dark, or short or tall,
She sets a springe to snare them all:
All's one to her--above her fan
She'd make sweet eyes at Caliban.

When friends are at your hearthside met,
Sweet courtesy has done its most
If you have made read more

When friends are at your hearthside met,
Sweet courtesy has done its most
If you have made each guest forget
That he himself is not the host.

In her eyes a thought
Grew sweeter and sweeter, deepening like the dawn,
A mystical forewarning.

In her eyes a thought
Grew sweeter and sweeter, deepening like the dawn,
A mystical forewarning.

I like not lady-slippers,
Not yet the sweet-pea blossoms,
Not yet the flaky roses,
read more

I like not lady-slippers,
Not yet the sweet-pea blossoms,
Not yet the flaky roses,
Red or white as snow;
I like the chaliced lilies,
The heavy Eastern lilies,
The gorgeous tiger-lilies,
That in our garden grow.