who would tell
A woman's place I do defy you all!
While justice lives, and love with joy is crowned
Woman and man must meet on equal ground.

The deepest wrong is falsehood. She who sells
Her soul and body for a little gain
In ease, or the world's notice, has a stain
Upon her soul no lighter for the bells
Of marriage rites, and purer far is she
Who gives her all for love's sad ecstasy.

Canst thou not understand a nature strong
And passionate, with impulses that sway,
With yearning tenderness that must have way,
Yet knows no ill desire, no touch of wrong?
If thou canst not then in God's name I pray
See me no more forever from this day.

Shadow Song.

The night is long
And there are no stars,--
Let me but dream
That the long fields gleam
With sunlight and song,
Then I shall not long
For the light of stars.

Let me but dream,--
For there are no stars,--
Dream that the ache
And the wild heart-break
Are but things that seem.
Ah! let me dream
For there are no stars.

Revulsion.

I see the starting buds, I catch the gleam
In the near distance of a sun-kissed pool,
The blessed April air blows soft and cool,
Small wonder if all sorrow grows a dream,
And we forget that close around us lie
A city's poor, a city's misery.

Of every outward vision there is some
Internal counterpart. To-day I know
The blessedness of living, and the glow
Of life's dear spring-tide. I can bid thee come
In thought and wander where the fields are fair
With bursting life, and I, rejoicing, there.

Yet have I passed, Beloved, through the vale
Of dark dismay, and felt the dews of death
Upon my brow, have measured out my breath
Counting my hours of joy, as misers quail
At every footfall in the quiet night
And clutch their gold and count it in affright.

I learned new lessons in that school of fear,
Life took a fresh perspective; sad and brave
The view is from the threshold of the grave.
In that long, backward glance I saw her clear
From fogs of gathering night, and all the show
Of small things that seemed great a while ago.

Our dreams of fame, the stubborn power we call
Our self-respect, our hopes of worldly good,