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JOHN JAMES PIATT.

READING THE MILESTONE.

I STOPPED to read the milestone here,
A laggard school-boy, long ago;
I came not far- my home was near-
But ah, how far I longed to go!
Behold a number and a name,

A finger, westward, cut in stone:
The vision of a city came,

Across the dust and distance shown.

Around me lay the farms asleep

In hazes of autumnal air,
And sounds that quiet loves to keep
Were heard, and heard not, every-
where.

I read the milestone, day by day:
I yearned to cross the barren bound,
To know the golden Far-away,
To walk the new Enchanted
Ground!

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Below, a violet in the dew

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THE GOLDEN HAND.

Lo, from the city's heat and dust
A golden hand forever thrust,
Uplifting from a spire on high
A shining finger in the sky!

I see it when the morning brings
Fresh tides of life to living things.

Breathed through the dark its And the great world awakes: behold, That lifted hand in morning gold!

vague perfume;

Above, a star in quiet blue

I see it when the noontide beats

Touched with a gracious ray the Pulses of fire in busy streets;

gloom.

"Sing, friend, of me," the violet sighed,

"That I may haunt your grave with love;' "Sing, friend, of me," the star replied,

"That I may light the dark above."

THE SIGHT OF ANGELS. THE angels come, the angels go, Through open doors of purer air;

The dust flies in the flaming air:
Above, that quiet hand is there.

To the dark earth with hovering
I see it when the twilight clings
Flashing with the last fluttering ray,
wings:
That golden hand remembers day.
The midnight comes- the holy hour:
The city like a giant flower
Sleeps full of dew: that hand, in light
Of moon and stars, how weirdly
bright!

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Good-night, then, lost darlings of It is nothing to see one's own tears

mine

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It is nothing to hear one's own I heart beat,

The sun will set.

pray you think how warm and

sweet

The heart can beat;

pray you think how soon the rose From grave-dust grows.

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The Pilgrim exile sainted name! The hill, whose icy brow

there.

I walk my parlor floor,

And, through the open door,

I hear a footfall on the chamber stair,
I'm stepping toward the hall,
To give the boy a call;

Rejoiced, when he came, in the morn- And then bethink me that he is

ing's flame,

In the morning's flame burns now. And the moon's cold light, as it lay

that night

On the hill-side and the sea, Still lies where he laid his houseless

head;

But the Pilgrim - where is he?

The Pilgrim Fathers are at rest:

When summer is throned on high, And the world's warm breast is in verdure dressed,

Go, stand on the hill where they lie. The earliest ray of the golden day, On that hallowed spot is cast; And the evening sun, as he leaves the world,

Looks kindly on that spot last.

not there:

I thread the crowded street,
A satchelled lad I meet,

With the same beaming eyes and col

ored hair:

And, as he 's running by, Follow him with my eye, Scarcely believing that he is not there!

I know his face is hid
Under the coffin lid:

Closed are his eyes: cold is his forehead fair;

My hand that marble felt:
O'er it in prayer I knelt

Yet my heart whispers that he is not there.

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