 | This, that and the other |  |
JUNE-DAY DREAMINGS.
Sitting on the mossy rock,
Where the shepherd guards the flock,
Where I used to sit of old,
Weaving chaplets manifold
(Strung with Fancy's threads of gold),
Has another tale been told.
Friends, that in other days
Roamed o'er these pleasant ways,
Far from my side have strayed,
To some fair realm of shade;
And in these lonely hours,
Girt round with withered flowers,
Wherein my weary eye
Turns to the watching sky,
Glances of pain,
Groping with outstretched hands,
Toward Death's shadow-lands,
They come, they come again!
Not as they came of old,
When spring-flowers were blowing,
Or summer streams a flowing;
When the very air was humming
With the birds and beetle-thrumming;
And the sunshine's paly gold
Where the shepherd guards the flock,
Where I used to sit of old,
Weaving chaplets manifold
(Strung with Fancy's threads of gold),
Has another tale been told.
Friends, that in other days
Roamed o'er these pleasant ways,
Far from my side have strayed,
To some fair realm of shade;
And in these lonely hours,
Girt round with withered flowers,
Wherein my weary eye
Turns to the watching sky,
Glances of pain,
Groping with outstretched hands,
Toward Death's shadow-lands,
They come, they come again!
Not as they came of old,
When spring-flowers were blowing,
Or summer streams a flowing;
When the very air was humming
With the birds and beetle-thrumming;
And the sunshine's paly gold
233
Lay upon the velvet moss,
Lay upon the road-side cross,
Stretching out its kindly arms
Like a hermit in a grove of palms,
Blessing dark-browed maids who bend,
Kneeling, in those groves of Ind!
There were bands of laughing girls,
With their waves of sunny hair,
Where the snow-drops gleamed like pearls,
Over brows more purely fair, —
With their laughter-trilling lips,
And the sunshine in their eyes,
Shining still, without eclipse,
When the stars are in the skies!
Many days we roamed together,
In the summer's long, blue light,
Chasing down the lengthening shadows,
Toward the corridors of night —
Pulling cowslips in the valleys,
Hunting berries in the wood,
Where the summer sunshine dallies
With the trailing golden-rod!
But my shadow has grown longer,
As I tread those meadows wide,
And no more in summer mornings
Other shadows fall beside!
And I seem to see a vision, —
For they come to me once more,
From the dusky realm of phantoms,
As they never came before, —
Putting back the golden tresses,
Which around their foreheads lay,
Lay upon the road-side cross,
Stretching out its kindly arms
Like a hermit in a grove of palms,
Blessing dark-browed maids who bend,
Kneeling, in those groves of Ind!
There were bands of laughing girls,
With their waves of sunny hair,
Where the snow-drops gleamed like pearls,
Over brows more purely fair, —
With their laughter-trilling lips,
And the sunshine in their eyes,
Shining still, without eclipse,
When the stars are in the skies!
Many days we roamed together,
In the summer's long, blue light,
Chasing down the lengthening shadows,
Toward the corridors of night —
Pulling cowslips in the valleys,
Hunting berries in the wood,
Where the summer sunshine dallies
With the trailing golden-rod!
But my shadow has grown longer,
As I tread those meadows wide,
And no more in summer mornings
Other shadows fall beside!
And I seem to see a vision, —
For they come to me once more,
From the dusky realm of phantoms,
As they never came before, —
Putting back the golden tresses,
Which around their foreheads lay,
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Like the smiling of the sunset
O'er the death-bed of the day,
With their blue eyes gazing upward,
And their pale hands clasped in prayer,
Journeyed they unto the country
Than all other lands more fair;
With my hands I cannot clasp them,
And my dim eyes cannot see
When they seem to smile upon me,
For the tears that in them be!
On the same gray rock I 'm sitting,
Still the butterflies are flitting —
Still the very air is humming
With the birds and beetle-thrumming;
Cowslips nod within the valleys,
Berries blush within the wood;
Still the summer sunshine dallies
With the trailing golden-rod, —
But they cannot give me pleasure;
To a slow and solemn measure
Treads my heart the march of life,
Getting weary with the strife;
Only spirits sit beside me,
Only air is on my brow;
Only unseen fingers guide me,
I am weary, — where art thou?
O'er the death-bed of the day,
With their blue eyes gazing upward,
And their pale hands clasped in prayer,
Journeyed they unto the country
Than all other lands more fair;
With my hands I cannot clasp them,
And my dim eyes cannot see
When they seem to smile upon me,
For the tears that in them be!
On the same gray rock I 'm sitting,
Still the butterflies are flitting —
Still the very air is humming
With the birds and beetle-thrumming;
Cowslips nod within the valleys,
Berries blush within the wood;
Still the summer sunshine dallies
With the trailing golden-rod, —
But they cannot give me pleasure;
To a slow and solemn measure
Treads my heart the march of life,
Getting weary with the strife;
Only spirits sit beside me,
Only air is on my brow;
Only unseen fingers guide me,
I am weary, — where art thou?
| This, that and the other | |