New Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

Oh the perfumes and the shadows of the pines in Verdleigh Coppice,
Straight red boles that catch the sunset as it smoulders in the west!
Creamy glint of waving barley, and a scarlet flash of poppies,
Seen through columns where the evening wind is moaning to its rest.

Here it seems the scent is deepest where the wind has caught the branches,
And a loaded bough lies broken, and the sap has oozed to light,

With its golden gums of healing, like the chastened love that staunches
With the morning's consolation some deep sorrow of the night.

With the piny odour streaming on the wind into my senses,
I grow flushed with subtle pleasure as an Eastern king may do
When the odalisque that loves him from her twinkling fan dispenses
An unceasing breeze of sandal-wood that stirs the chamber through.

And my heart is still from fretting, and my pulse's weary fever
Settles slowly down to cool and calm vibration of the blood;

I could rest upon the greenness of this mossy couch for ever,
And become a silent portion of the silence of the wood.

I should feel the sap in spring-tide as a part of my existence,
And the pure sweet life of blossoms would repeat itself in me,
Till the old world's course of passion, with its wearisome insistence,
Should fade back and be forgotten in this milder ecstasy.

Surely all things here are quiet, and this still domain of nature
Tastes in little all the sweetness of the vanished golden age;

Love enthroned among these pine-trees smiles on every sylvan creature,
And the pastorals they fashion on this stainless rustic stage.

But among the elms that cluster round the stately Hall up yonder,
Where the ladies praise the prospect from the terrace at their feet,
Like a caged thing sick in exile with a smiling face I wander,
And with viewless wings the barrier, be it golden, still I beat!

For the idle jesting frets me, and my heart in its dejection
Smiles like Timon with the laughter of a spirit out of tune,

At the courtly face-politeness and the cordial mockaffection,
And the unknown lightless facet of each white revolving moon.

As the shadows of this pine-copse to a ring of foolish faces,
As this perfume of the woodland to a faded waft of musk,
So my heart that leaps with pleasure in all hushed sequestered places,
To the self-same heart that battles in this world of claw and tusk.

Ah! warm pines of Verdleigh Coppice, I must hold to you for ever,
Build my home in you, like Thoreau, be your creature and your child,

Till no vestige of the worldling rest upon my soul to sever
My enfranchised heart and body from all gentle things and wild.

Here be sure no savage discords break the joyous diapason
Of the vast and secret music of all vocal things and mute,
Love the sweet birds' only clarion, love the blossoms' only blazon,
Love the animating purpose in each kindling vein and shoot.

Hush! the cruel stoat that rustles in the tangle of the brambles,
Sleek, with snow-white fangs that languish for the rabbit's drip of blood;—

Hush! the jay with laugh discordant as far up the tree he scrambles
With a hungry beak to slaughter the soft younglings of the wood.

Hush! an orange bee floats by me, like a summer wind incarnate,
But a red flash swoops athwart it and behold it upward borne!
'Twas the bright crest of the wood-chat, like the sunlight in a garnet,
And the writhing bee hangs wretchedly impaled upon a thorn.

See this mastering mass of ivy with an ash-tree bound within it,
Like a wrestler foiled and strangled, lo! the friendly ash is dead;

And the ivy bears half-hidden the forlorn nest of a linnet,
But the rain has drowned the nurselings, and the parentbirds have fled.

Even here, in Verdleigh Coppice, there can be such desolation,
Such forgetfulness untender, such a cruel greed and rage,
Underneath the summer odours nation warring against nation,
And the gentlest creatures winning bitter pain for heritage.

Not in homes of mankind only, are there silent webs for passion,
And a smiling garb for sorrow, and a sunny veil for grief

Nature works out her intention in the same unholy fashion
As her aping firstborn Man does through his foolish day and brief.

Then farewell, sweet Verdleigh Coppice, since I find for all the beauty
Of thine allies hushed and sombre, of thy glimpses of the wheat,
Here as elsewhere love resides not, and red rapine is a duty,
Thou shalt hardly win long sojourn from my restless, homeless feet.

And I learn 'tis best in all things to hold living very lightly,
Taste the perfumes of the fir-wood, but not linger there too long,

Lest the mazes of the forest lead to foulnesses unsightly,
And a haunting horror clash upon the night-bird's liquid song.