Free Great Poems by American Women by Susan L. Rattiner Page A

in one line—
What you write will be finer, if ’tis not too fine.
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    Pray, don’t let the thread of your subject be strung
With “golden,” and “shimmer,” “sweet,” “filter,” and “flung;”
Nor compel, by your style, all your readers to guess
You’ve been looking up words Webster marks obs.
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    And another thing: whatever else you may say,
Do keep personalities out of the way;
Don’t try every sentence to make people see
What a dear, charming creature the writer must be!
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    Leave out affectations and pretty appeals;
Don’t “drag yourself in by the neck and the heels,”
Your dear little boots, and your gloves; and take heed,
Nor pull your curls over men’s eyes while they read.
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    Don’t mistake me; I mean that the public’s not home,
You must do as the Romans do, when you’re in Rome;
I would have you be womanly, while you are wise;
’Tis the weak and the womanish tricks I despise.
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    On the other hand: don’t write and dress in such styles
As astonish the natives, and frighten the isles;
Do look, on the platform, so folks in the show
Needn’t ask, “Which are lions, and which tigers?” you know!
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    â€˜Tis a good thing to write, and to rule in the state,
But to be a true, womanly woman is great:
And if ever you come to be that, ’twill be when
You can cease to be babies, nor try to be men!

LUCY LARCOM (1824—1893)
    Lucy Larcom of Beverly, Massachusetts, began writing poems when she was seven and worked in a mill when she was only eleven. She contributed verse to magazines and published her first book, a series of prose poems, Similitudes from Ocean and Prairie , in 1854. In the same year, her poem “Call to Kansas” won a prize from the New England Emigrant Aid Company. She taught college from 1854 to 1862, and edited Our Folks Magazine from 1865-73. Larcom published Childhood Songs (1873), Idyl of Work (1875), a blank verse narrative of mill life, and A New England Girlhood (1889), an autobiographical story. Along with John Greenleaf Whittier, Larcom edited the anthologies Child Life (1871) and Songs of Three Centuries (1883).
    Plant a Tree
    He who plants a tree
    Plants a hope.
    Rootlets up through fibres blindly grope;
    Leaves unfold into horizons free.
    So man’s life must climb
    From the clods of time
    Unto heavens sublime.
    Canst thou prophesy, thou little tree,
    What the glory of thy boughs shall be?
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    He who plants a tree
    Plants a joy;
    Plants a comfort that will never cloy;
    Every day a fresh reality,
    Beautiful and strong,
    To whose shelter throng
    Creatures blithe with song.
    If thou couldst but know, thou happy tree,
    Of the bliss that shall inhabit thee!
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    He who plants a tree,—
    He plants peace.
    Under its green curtains jargons cease.
    Leaf and zephyr murmur soothingly;
    Shadows soft with sleep
    Down tired eyelids creep,
    Balm of slumber deep.
    Never hast thou dreamed, thou blessed tree,
    Of the benediction thou shalt be.
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    He who plants a tree,—
    He plants youth;
    Vigor won for centuries in sooth;
    Life of time, that hints eternity!
    Boughs their strength uprear;
    New shoots, every year,
    On old growths appear;
    Thou shalt teach the ages, sturdy tree,
    Youth of soul is immortality.
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    He who plants a tree,—
    He plants love,
    Tents of coolness spreading out above
    Wayfarers he may not live to see.
    Gifts that grow are best;
    Hands that bless are blest;
    Plant! life does the rest!
    Heaven and earth help him who plants a tree,
    And his work its own reward shall be.
    A Strip of Blue
    I do not own an inch of land,
    But all I see is mine,—
    The orchard and the mowing-fields,
    The lawns and gardens fine.
    The winds my tax-collectors are,
    They bring me tithes divine,—
    Wild scents and subtle essences,
    A tribute rare and free;
    And, more magnificent than all,
    My window keeps for me
    A glimpse of blue