University of Virginia Library

In the Woods.

A sternly subtle horror grew within
The deep and shaggy wood; it seemed akin
To my sad thoughts; went on with scarce a turn
The timber pathway, till a sullen burn
Spread sideways like a white and whispering ghost,
So rippling into darkness and so lost.
Above the swamp the giant trees embrace
Like wrestling dragons, underneath the lace
Of their broad pennons; here a sullen bough
Short-lopped, gleams whitely, threatening through the sough
Of all the distant tree-tops, bids me cast
My weary expectation here at last.
I fall, I sink, beneath the leafy walls,
Which clash a little as the water falls
From bedded roots, and as the wistful wind
Once more bends back the trees: as if a blind
Sunbeam dashed yellow o'er the gloomy frond,
A strange decay is stealing over yond
Sycamore, touching half its leaves with green
Of sickly paleness, as I lie between
High springing grasses headed with small flowers.
The foxglove drops the bell the bee devours,
And lo! a keener pang in my lost peace
Speaks meaningly; the woodland terrors cease
As the wild bee from the deserted bell
Hums fiercely forth; the stern clouds upward swell,
The ghostly water whispers now no more,
The twining trees are hidden on the shore,
As the light dies too; rolling rank on rank,
The waves of darkness swallow up in blank
Submersion all things: then within my soul
Awoke a harmony that blent the whole
Of life—can death do more, shall death do less?
O soul of my past life! the bitterness
Of thy past pain hurts not the thing I am
In this deep hour; the senses cannot cram
The spirit with fresh food for memories;
No object now to eye or ear can rise,
And so the spirit settles into peace
Self-drawn, or drawn from Him who makes to cease
All trouble, and the inmost spirit bids
Consist in peace; who nightly seals our lids
For this, and gives us timely hours like those,
When even the heart the spirit's calm o'erflows.
With whitest robes, whenever death shall come,
Shall both his hands be filled. We travel home.