Flower o' the thorn A book of wayside verse: By John Payne |
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| I. |
| II. | II. THE HUSH OF THE HILLS. |
| III. |
| IV. |
| V. |
| VI. |
| VII. |
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 | Flower o' the thorn |  |
112
II. THE HUSH OF THE HILLS.
ABOUT the slumbering plains, in moonshine steeping,
Gaunt, stern and white,
The mountains stand, like giant warders keeping
The watch of night.
Gaunt, stern and white,
The mountains stand, like giant warders keeping
The watch of night.
The moon upon them pours, the still world winding
In stark repose,
Unto Earth's transient green with silver binding
Th'eternal snows.
In stark repose,
Unto Earth's transient green with silver binding
Th'eternal snows.
The summer landscape by the weird light shrouded
In Winter's hue,
The lonely mountains and the valleys crowded
Are like to view.
In Winter's hue,
The lonely mountains and the valleys crowded
Are like to view.
Life in the sun-flood and the daylight's fountains
Thrones on the plain;
But in the moon-pale night the placid mountains
All Life o'erreign.
Thrones on the plain;
But in the moon-pale night the placid mountains
All Life o'erreign.
There, smiling down on Earth's unending changes
Their changeless smile,
To Heaven their rude, unalterable ranges,
Pile over pile,
Their changeless smile,
To Heaven their rude, unalterable ranges,
Pile over pile,
They lift, their sempiternal witness bearing
To the world's Prime,
Its ageless ermine on their shoulders wearing
Of snow and rime.
To the world's Prime,
Its ageless ermine on their shoulders wearing
Of snow and rime.
113
To fore-eternal epochs testifying,
When, frozen deep,
The dead world slumbered, stark and silent lying
In the ice-sleep,
When, frozen deep,
The dead world slumbered, stark and silent lying
In the ice-sleep,
There, in the calm of certitude unbating,
They stand at gaze,
The aeon's foreassigned return awaiting,
Th'appointed days,
They stand at gaze,
The aeon's foreassigned return awaiting,
Th'appointed days,
When, the last fire-cell frozen at Earth's centre,
Shall sea and shore
Their antenatal graves of gloom reenter
For evermore,
Shall sea and shore
Their antenatal graves of gloom reenter
For evermore,
When Life fore'er from out Time's faded pages
Shall blotted be
And they alone look down, like snow-clad sages,
On shore and sea.
Shall blotted be
And they alone look down, like snow-clad sages,
On shore and sea.
To them our fleeting day of feeble violence
A hyphen seems
Between two grim eternities of silence
And glacial dreams.
A hyphen seems
Between two grim eternities of silence
And glacial dreams.
| Flower o' the thorn | |