 | The heir of the world, and lesser poems |  |
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THE BACKWOODSMAN.
I.
Morn broke upon his silent wake,Amid the forest's vaulted shade,
And the deep wave of Spirit Lake
Gleam'd like a glory though the glade,
Where stood the hunter's cheerless hut,
His wildwood home when peril pressed,
Where now he lay, with eyelids shut,
In his last, deep, undreaming rest.
II.
Oh! awfully the hand of deathLies on the hollow sunken eye!
The wan, cold lips, that have no breath!
The brow that tells what 'tis to die!
Mid the deep pillared wood, that sent
Ten thousand mighty voices up,
The worn and weary hunter bent,
And drain'd the dregs of death's dark cup.
III.
The heart of those vast solitudesBeat deeply while his spirit passed;
His dirge was borne through pathless woods,
On the broad wings of autumn's blast;
And while—a thousand leagues from men,
The trapper sat beside the dead,
He sigh'd that none was left him then
To lay earth's dust upon his head.
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IV.
But he went forth upon the glade,And digg'd his friend a narrow home,
And then, with high heart undismayed,
Return'd into the cabin's gloom,
And lifted up, and carried forth
The friend of many a lingering year,
And laid him in his mother earth
With a sick heart that shed no tear.
V.
He filled the grave—the turf he piledOn the cold bosom of the dead,
And then looked up;—the bright sun smiled,
And morn's light o'er the blue wave spread.
But the blest beam of human eyes,
The welcome voice, though harsh and rude,
No more beneath those lonely skies
Can cheer the trapper's solitude.
VI.
Sleep, lone man, where the giant trees,Like a broad swelling ocean, sweep!
Where, like the sounds of stormy seas,
The forests bend and murmur, sleep!
Cities may tower where thou art laid,
Pilgrim! that ledst a nation on!
And pow'r guide empire through the shade
That on thee falls, thou forest-son.
| The heir of the world, and lesser poems | |