Part 5 (1/2)

_The Lottery Girl_

”Lottery, lottery, Take a chance at the lottery?

Take a ticket, Or, better, take two; Who knows what the future May hold for you?

Lottery, lottery, Take a chance at the lottery?”

Oh, limpid-eyed girl, I would take every chance, If only the prize Were a love-flas.h.i.+ng glance From your fathomless eyes.

”Lottery, lottery, Try your luck at the lottery?

Consider the size Of the capital prize, And take tickets For the lottery.

Tickets, _senor_? Tickets, _senor_?

Take a chance at the lottery?”

Oh, crimson-lipped girl, With the magical smile, I would count that the gamble Were well worth the while, Not a chance would I miss, If only the prize Were a honey-bee kiss Gathered in sips From those full-ripened lips, And a love-flas.h.i.+ng glance From your eyes.

V

_The Dancing Girl_

Do you know what it is to dance?

Perhaps, you do know, in a fas.h.i.+on; But by dancing I mean, Not what's generally seen, But dancing of fire and pa.s.sion, Of fire and delirious pa.s.sion.

With a dusky-haired _senorita_, Her dark, misty eyes near your own, And her scarlet-red mouth, Like a rose of the south, The reddest that ever was grown, So close that you catch Her quick-panting breath As across your own face it is blown, With a sigh, and a moan.

Ah! that is dancing, As here by the Carib it's known.

Now, whirling and twirling Like furies we go; Now, soft and caressing And sinuously slow; With an undulating motion, Like waves on a breeze-kissed ocean:-- And the scarlet-red mouth Is nearer your own, And the dark, misty eyes Still softer have grown.

Ah! that is dancing, that is loving, As here by the Carib they're known.

VI

_Sunset in the Tropics_

A silver flash from the sinking sun, Then a shot of crimson across the sky That, bursting, lets a thousand colors fly And riot among the clouds; they run, Deepening in purple, flaming in gold, Changing, and opening fold after fold, Then fading through all of the tints of the rose into gray, Till, taking quick fright at the coming night, They rush out down the west, In hurried quest Of the fleeing day.

Now above where the tardiest color flares a moment yet, One point of light, now two, now three are set To form the starry stairs,-- And, in her fire-fly crown, Queen Night, on velvet slippered feet, comes softly down.

AND THE GREATEST OF THESE IS WAR

Around the council-board of h.e.l.l, with Satan at their head, The Three Great Scourges of humanity sat.

Gaunt Famine, with hollow cheek and voice, arose and spoke,-- ”O, Prince, I have stalked the earth, And my victims by ten thousands I have slain, I have smitten old and young.

Mouths of the helpless old moaning for bread, I have filled with dust; And I have laughed to see a crying babe tug at the shriveling breast Of its mother, dead and cold.

I have heard the cries and prayers of men go up to a tearless sky, And fall back upon an earth of ashes; But, heedless, I have gone on with my work.

'Tis thus, O, Prince, that I have scourged mankind.”