But if, where silvery currents rove,
Thy heart, grown still and sage,
Hath learned to read the words of love
That shine o'er nature's page;
If holy thoughts thy guests have been,
Under the shade of willows green;
Then, lover of the silent hour,
By deep lone waters past,
Thence hast thou drawn a faith, a power,
To cheer thee through the last;
And, wont on brighter worlds to dwell,
May'st calmly bid thy streams farewell.
I LEFT my home;-'twas in a little vale,
Sheltered from snow-storms by the stately pines;
A small clear river wandered quietly,
Its smooth waves only cut by the light barks
Of fishers, and but darkened by the shade.
The willows flung, when to the southern wind
They threw their long green tresses. On the slope
Were five or six white cottages, whose roofs
Reached not to the laburnum's height, whose boughs
Shook over them bright showers of golden bloom.
Sweet silence reigned around :-no other sound
Came on the air, than when the shepherd made
The reed-pipe rudely musical, or notes
From the wild birds, or children in their play
Sending forth shouts or laughter. Strangers came
Rarely or never near the lonely place. . .
I went into far countries. Years past by,
But still that vale in silent beauty dwelt
Within my memory. Home I came at last.
I stood upon a mountain height, and looked
Into the vale below; and smoke arose,
And heavy sounds; and thro' the thick dim air
Shot blackened turrets, and brick walls, and roofs
Of the red tile. I entered in the streets:
There were ten thousand hurrying to and fro;
And masted vessels stood upon the river,
And barges sullied the once dew-clear stream.
Where were the willows, where the cottages?
I sought my home; I sought and found a city,--
Alas! for the green valley!
WHAN that the misty vapor was agone,
And cleare and faire was the morning,
The dewe also like silver in shining
Upon the leaves, as any baume swete,
Till firy Titan with his persant hete
Had dried up the lusty licour new
Upon the herbes in the grene mede,
And that the floures of many divers hew,
Upon hir stalkes gon for to sprede,
And for to splay out her leves in brede
Againe the Sunne, gold burned in his sphere,
That doune to hem cast his beames clere.
And by a river forth I gan costay,
Of water clere as birell or cristall,
Till at the last, I found a little way
Toward a parke, enclosed with a wall
In compace rounde, and by a gate small
Who so that would might freely gone
Into this parke, walled with grene stone.
And in I went to heare the birdes song,
Which on the braunches, both in plaine and vale,
So loud sang that all the wood rong,
Like as it should shiver in peeces smale,
And, as methought, that the nightingale
With so great might her voice gan out wrest,
Right as her herte for love would brest.
The soile was plaine, smoth, and wonder soft,
All oversprad with tapettes that Nature
Had made her selfe: covered eke aloft
With bowes greene the floures for to cure,
That in hir beauty they may long endure
From all assaut of Phebus fervent fere,
Which in his sphere so hote shone and clere.
The aire attempre, and the smothe wind
Of Zepherus, among the blossoms white,
So holesome was, and so nourishing by kind,
That smale buddes and round blossoms lite.
In manner gan of hir brethe delite,
To yeve us hope there fruite shall take
Ayenst autumne rely for to shake.
I saw the Daphene closed under rinde,
Greene laurer, and the holesome pine,
The mirre also that weepeth ever of kinde,
The cedres hie, upright as a line,
The filbert eke, that lowe doth encline
Her bowes grene to the earth adoun,
Unto her knight called Demophoun.
There sawe I eke the fresh hauthorne,
In white motley, that so swete doth smell,
Ashe, firre, and oke, with many a young acorn,
And many a tree mo than I can tell,
And me beforne I saw a little well,
That had his course, as I gan beholde,
Under an hill, with quicke stremes colde.
The gravel gold, the water pure as glasse,
The bankes round the well environyng,
And soft as velvet the yonge grasse
That thereupon lustely came springyng,
The sute of trees about compassyng,
Hir shadow cast, closing the well round,
And all the herbes growing on the ground.
|