 | Forest Notes |  |
33
VOICES
We lie amid the green waves of the grass,
Lapped in the radiance of love's sunny dream,
Nor hear the distant murmur of the wood,
Echoes that through the forest branches moan,
Beyond these placid billows where the heart
Drifts on the grasses in the summer sun.
Lapped in the radiance of love's sunny dream,
Nor hear the distant murmur of the wood,
Echoes that through the forest branches moan,
Beyond these placid billows where the heart
Drifts on the grasses in the summer sun.
What reck we of the tempest, we who dream
And laugh beyond the voices of the wood,
Deaf to the sadness of the fitful moan?
Life gives an hour for joy to every heart;
One hour to feel the breezes, know the sun,
And watch the ripples rippling on the grass.
And laugh beyond the voices of the wood,
Deaf to the sadness of the fitful moan?
Life gives an hour for joy to every heart;
One hour to feel the breezes, know the sun,
And watch the ripples rippling on the grass.
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The grass-waves lap the margin of the wood;
We listen wistful to the branches' moan
That echoes from the forest's hollow heart,
And menaces the gladness of the sun;
It calls us from the sunny waves of grass
Into the shadow of a darker dream.
We listen wistful to the branches' moan
That echoes from the forest's hollow heart,
And menaces the gladness of the sun;
It calls us from the sunny waves of grass
Into the shadow of a darker dream.
The deepened voice of that compelling moan
Wakens the yearning of each human heart
Rejoicing in the gladness of the sun;
Tossed on the living ripple of the grass:
“Love, must we wake from love's triumphant dream
To heed the solemn moaning of the wood,—
Wakens the yearning of each human heart
Rejoicing in the gladness of the sun;
Tossed on the living ripple of the grass:
“Love, must we wake from love's triumphant dream
To heed the solemn moaning of the wood,—
“Though love endureth in the lover's heart?
Though it is good to see the summer sun?
Though July breathes across the blades of grass
And lifts their green waves, like a tide a-dream,
Up to the margin of the shadowy wood
Where the great caverns of the branches moan?”
Though it is good to see the summer sun?
Though July breathes across the blades of grass
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Up to the margin of the shadowy wood
Where the great caverns of the branches moan?”
No answer cometh from the joyous sun,
Nor any voice from sunlit seas of grass,
Nor any surety that love dreams no dream.
The grave, unsilenced voices of the wood
Pitched to eternity shall ever moan
Their troubled menace to the troubled heart.
Nor any voice from sunlit seas of grass,
Nor any surety that love dreams no dream.
The grave, unsilenced voices of the wood
Pitched to eternity shall ever moan
Their troubled menace to the troubled heart.
ENVOY
Though flesh be grass, love but a changeful dream,And in the wood Death makes his warning moan,
Be glad, oh heart! life lives in earth and sun.
A.
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