If, the quiet brooklet leaving,
Up the stony vale I wind,
Haply half in fancy grieving
For the shades I leave behind,
By the dusty wayside drear,
Nightingales with joyous cheer
Sing, my sadness to reprove,
Gladlier than in cultured grove.
Where the thickest boughs are twining
Of the greenest, darkest tree,
There they plunge, the light declining-
All may hear, but none may see.
Fearless of the passing hoof,
Hardly will they fleet aloof;
So they live in modest ways,
Trust entire, and ceaseless praise.
HEDGEROWS IN APRIL.
I HAVE found violets. April hath come on,
And the cool winds feel softer, and the rain
Falls in the beaded drops of Summer time.
You may hear birds at morning, and at eve
The tame dove lingers till the twilight falls,
Cooing upon the eaves, and drawing in
His beautiful bright neck, and from the hills
A murmur, like the hoarseness of the sea,
Tells the release of waters, and the earth
Sends up a pleasant smell, and the dry leaves
Are lifted by the grass-and so I know
That Nature, from her delicate ear, hath heard
The dropping of the velvet foot of Spring.
I love to go in the capricious days
Of April and hunt violets-when the rain.
Is in the blue cups trembling, and they nod
So gracefully to the kisses of the wind.
It may be deemed unmanly, but the wise
Read Nature like the manuscript of Heaven,
And call the flowers its poetry. Go out!
Ye spirits of habitual unrest,
And read it when the fever of the world
Hath made your hearts impatient, and, if life
Hath yet one spring unpoisoned, it will be
Like a beguiling music to its flow,
And you will no more wonder that I love
To hunt for violets in the April time.
A FRAGMENT of a rainbow bright
Through the moist air I see,
All dark and damp on yonder height,
All bright and clear to me.
An hour ago the storm was here,
The gleam was far behind:
So will our joys and griefs appear
When earth has ceased to blind.
Grief will be joy if on its edge
Fall soft that holiest ray,
Joy will be grief if no faint pledge
Be there of heavenly day.
DIP down upon the northern shore,
O sweet new year, delaying long;
Thou doest expectant Nature wrong
Delaying long; delay no more.
What stays thee from the clouded noons,
Thy sweetness from its proper place?
Can trouble live with April days,
Or sadness in the Summer moons?
Bring orchis, bring the foxglove spire,
The little speedwell's darling blue,
Deep tulips dashed with fiery dew,
Laburnums, dropping-wells of fire.
O thou, new year, delaying long,
Delay'st the sorrow in my blood, That longs to burst a frozen bud, And flood a fresher throat with song.
Now fades the last long streak of snow, Now burgeons every maze of quick About the flowering squares, and thick By ashen roots the violets blow.
Now rings the woodland loud and long, The distance takes a lovelier hue, And, drowned in yonder living blue, The lark becomes a sightless song.
Now dance the lights on lawn and lea,
The flocks are whiter down the vale,
And milkier every milky sail
On winding stream or distant sea;
Where now the sea-mew pipes, or dives
In yonder greening gleam, and fly
The happy birds, that change their sky
To build and brood; that live their lives
From land to land; and in my breast
Spring wakens too; and my regret
Becomes an April violet,
And buds and blossoms like the rest.
SPREAD around thy tenderest diligence
In flowery Spring-time, when the new-dropt lamb,
Tottering with weakness by his mother's side,
Feels the fresh world about him; and each thorn,
Hillock, or furrow, trips his feeble feet:
Oh, guard his meek, sweet innocence from all
Th' innumerous ills that rush around his life;
Mark the quick kite, with beak and talons prone,
Circling the skies to snatch him from the plain;
Observe the lurking crows; beware the brake,
There the sly fox the careless minute waits;
Nor trust thy neighbour's dog, nor earth, nor sky:
Thy bosom to a thousand cares divide.
Eurus oft slings his hail; the tardy fields
Pay not their promised food; and oft the dam
O'er her weak twins with empty udder mourns,
Or fails to guard, when the bold bird of prey
Alights, and hops in many turns around,
And tires her, also turning: to her aid
Be nimble, and the weakest, in thine arms,
Gently convey to the warm cote, and oft,
Between the lark's note and the nightingale's,
His hungry bleating still with tepid milk;
In this soft office may thy children join,
And charitable habits learn in sport;
Nor yield him to himself, ere vernal airs
Sprinkle thy little croft with daisy flowers.
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