Lyrics of Earth | Page 5

of the silent wood,
As if from the closing door
Of another
world and another lovelier mood,
Hear'st thou the hermit pour--
So sweet! so magical!--
His golden music, ghostly beautiful.
AFTER RAIN
For three whole days across the sky,
In sullen packs that loomed and
broke,
With flying fringes dim as smoke,
The columns of the rain
went by;
At every hour the wind awoke;
The darkness passed upon the plain;
The great drops rattled at the
pane.
Now piped the wind, or far aloof
Fell to a sough remote and dull;

And all night long with rush and lull
The rain kept drumming on the

roof:
I heard till ear and sense were full
The clash or silence of the leaves,
The gurgle in the creaking eaves.
But when the fourth day came--at noon,
The darkness and the rain
were by;
The sunward roofs were steaming dry;
And all the world
was flecked and strewn
With shadows from a fleecy sky.
The haymakers were forth and gone,
And every rillet laughed and
shone.
Then, too, on me that loved so well
The world, despairing in her
blight,
Uplifted with her least delight,
On me, as on the earth, there
fell
New happiness of mirth and might;
I strode the valleys pied and still;
I climbed upon the breezy hill.
I watched the gray hawk wheel and drop,
Sole shadow on the shining
world;
I saw the mountains clothed and curled,
With forest ruffling
to the top;
I saw the river's length unfurled,
Pale silver down the fruited plain,
Grown great and stately with the
rain.
Through miles of shadow and soft heat,
Where field and fallow, fence
and tree,
Were all one world of greenery,
I heard the robin ringing
sweet,
The sparrow piping silverly,
The thrushes at the forest's hem;
And as I went I sang with them.
CLOUD-BREAK
With a turn of his magical rod,
That extended and suddenly shone,

From the round of his glory some god
Looks forth and is gone.
To the summit of heaven the clouds
Are rolling aloft like steam;


There's a break in their infinite shrouds,
And below it a gleam.
O'er
the drift of the river a whiff
Comes out from the blossoming shore;

And the meadows are greening, as if
They never were green before.
The islands are kindled with gold
And russet and emerald dye;
And
the interval waters outrolled
Are more blue than the sky.
From my
feet to the heart of the hills
The spirits of May intervene,
And a
vapor of azure distills
Like a breath on the opaline green.
Only a moment!--and then
The chill and the shadow decline,
On the
eyes of rejuvenate men
That were wide and divine.
THE MOON-PATH
The full, clear moon uprose and spread
Her cold, pale splendor o'er
the sea;
A light-strewn path that seemed to lead
Outward into
eternity.
Between the darkness and the gleam
An old-world spell
encompassed me:
Methought that in a godlike dream
I trod upon
the sea.
And lo! upon that glimmering road,
In shining companies unfurled,

The trains of many a primal god,
The monsters of the elder world;

Strange creatures that, with silver wings,
Scarce touched the ocean's
thronging floor,
The phantoms of old tales, and things
Whose
shapes are known no more.
Giants and demi-gods who once
Were dwellers of the earth and sea,

And they who from Deucalion's stones,
Rose men without an
infancy;
Beings on whose majestic lids
Time's solemn secrets
seemed to dwell,
Tritons and pale-limbed Nereids,
And forms of
heaven and hell.
Some who were heroes long of yore,
When the great world was hale
and young;
And some whose marble lips yet pour

The murmur of
an antique tongue;
Sad queens, whose names are like soft moans,


Whose griefs were written up in gold;
And some who on their silver
thrones
Were goddesses of old.
As if I had been dead indeed,
And come into some after-land,
I saw
them pass me, and take heed,
And touch me with each mighty hand;

And evermore a murmurous stream,
So beautiful they seemed to
me,
Not less than in a godlike dream
I trod the shining sea.
COMFORT OF THE FIELDS
What would'st thou have for easement after grief,
When the rude
world hath used thee with despite,
And care sits at thine elbow day
and night,
Filching thy pleasures like a subtle thief?
To me, when
life besets me in such wise,
'Tis sweetest to break forth, to drop the
chain,
And grasp the freedom of this pleasant earth,
To roam in
idleness and sober mirth,
Through summer airs and summer lands,
and drain
The comfort of wide fields unto tired eyes.
By hills and waters, farms and solitudes,
To wander by the day with
wilful feet;
Through fielded valleys wide with yellowing wheat;

Along gray roads that run between deep woods,
Murmurous and cool;
through hallowed slopes of pine,
Where the long daylight dreams,
unpierced, unstirred, And only the rich-throated thrush is heard;
By
lonely forest brooks that froth and shine
In bouldered crannies buried
in the hills;
By broken beeches tangled with wild vine,
And
log-strewn rivers murmurous with mills.
In upland pastures, sown with gold, and sweet
With the keen perfume
of the ripening grass,
Where wings of birds and filmy shadows pass,

Spread thick as stars with shining marguerite;
To haunt old fences
overgrown with brier,
Muffled in vines, and hawthorns, and wild
cherries,
Rank