Poems In Two Volumes, vol 2 | Page 5

Yarrow Stream unseen, unknown!
It must, or we shall rue it: 50
We have a vision of our own;
Ah! why should we undo it?
The
treasured dreams of times long past
We'll keep them, winsome
Marrow!
For when we're there although 'tis fair
'Twill be another
Yarrow!"
"If Care with freezing years should come,
And wandering seem but
folly,
Should we be loth to stir from home,
And yet be melancholy;
60 Should life be dull, and spirits low,
'Twill soothe us in our sorrow

That earth has something yet to show,
The bonny Holms of
Yarrow!"
MOODS OF MY OWN MIND.
0. TO A BUTTERFLY.
Stay near me--do not take thy flight!
A little longer stay in sight!

Much converse do I find in Thee,
Historian of my Infancy!
Float
near me; do not yet depart!
Dead times revive in thee:
Thou bring'st,

gay Creature as thou art!
A solemn image to my heart,
My Father's
Family!
Oh! pleasant, pleasant were the days,
The time, when in our childish
plays
My sister Emmeline and I
Together chaced the Butterfly!
A
very hunter did I rush
Upon the prey:--with leaps and springs
I
follow'd on from brake to bush;
But She, God love her! feared to
brush
The dust from off its wings.
2.
The Sun has long been set:
The Stars are out by twos and threes;

The little Birds are piping yet
Among the bushes and trees;
There's
a Cuckoo, and one or two thrushes;
And a noise of wind that rushes,

With a noise of water that gushes;
And the Cuckoo's sovereign cry

Fills all the hollow of the sky!
Who would go "parading" 10 In London, and "masquerading,"
On
such a night of June?
With that beautiful soft half-moon,
And all
these innocent blisses,
On such a night as this is!
3.
O Nightingale! thou surely art
A Creature of a fiery heart--
These
notes of thine they pierce, and pierce;
Tumultuous harmony and
fierce!
Thou sing'st as if the God of wine
Had help'd thee to a
Valentine;
A song in mockery and despite
Of shades, and dews, and
silent Night,
And steady bliss, and all the Loves
Now sleeping in
these peaceful groves! 10
I heard a Stockdove sing or say
His homely tale, this very day.
His
voice was buried among trees,
Yet to be come at by the breeze:
He
did not cease; but coo'd--and coo'd;
And somewhat pensively he
woo'd:
He sang of love with quiet blending,
Slow to begin, and
never ending;

Of serious faith, and inward glee;
That was the Song,

the Song for me! 20
4.
My heart leaps up when I behold
A Rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I
am a Man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is Father of the Man;
And I could wish my
days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
5. WRITTEN IN MARCH,
While resting on the Bridge at the Foot of Brother's Water.
The cook is crowing,
The stream is flowing,
The small birds twitter,

The lake doth glitter,
The green field sleeps in the sun;
The oldest and youngest
Are at work with the strongest;
The cattle
are grazing,
Their heads never raising;
There are forty feeding like
one! 10
Like an army defeated
The Snow hath retreated,
And now doth fare
ill
On the top of the bare hill;
The Plough-boy is
whooping--anon--anon:
There's joy in the mountains;
There's life in the fountains;
Small
clouds are sailing,
Blue sky prevailing;
The rain is over and gone!
20
6. THE SMALL CELANDINE.
Common Pilewort.
There is a Flower, the Lesser Celandine,
That shrinks, like many
more, from cold and rain;
And, the first moment that the sun may

shine,
Bright as the sun itself, 'tis out again!
When hailstones have been falling swarm on swarm,
Or blasts the
green field and the trees distress'd,
Oft have I seen it muffled up from
harm,
In close self-shelter, like a Thing at rest.
But lately, one rough day, this Flower I pass'd,
And recognized it,
though an alter'd Form, 10 Now standing forth an offering to the Blast,

And buffetted at will by Rain and Storm,
I stopp'd, and said with inly muttered voice,
"It doth not love the
shower, nor seek the cold:
This neither is it's courage nor it's choice,

But it's necessity in being old."
The sunshine may not bless it, nor the dew;
It cannot help itself in it's
decay;
Stiff in it's members, wither'd, changed of hue.
And, in my
spleen, I smiled that it was grey. 20
To be a Prodigal's Favorite--then, worse truth,
A Miser's
Pensioner--behold our lot!
O Man! that from thy fair and shining
youth
Age might but take the things Youth needed not!
7.
I wandered lonely as a Cloud
That floats on high o'er Vales and Hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd
A host of dancing Daffodills;

Along the Lake, beneath the trees,
Ten thousand dancing in the
breeze.
The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves
in glee:--
A Poet could not but be gay
In such a laughing company:
10 I gaz'd--and gaz'd--but little thought
What wealth the shew to me
had brought:
For oft when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They

flash upon that inward