AFTER A LECTURE ON WORDSWORTH

COME, spread your wings, as I spread mine,

And leave the crowded hall

For where the eyes of twilight shine

O'er evening's western wall.

These are the pleasant Berkshire hills,

Each with its leafy crown;

Hark! from their sides a thousand rills

Come singing sweetly down.

A thousand rills; they leap and shine,

Strained through the shadowy nooks,

Till, clasped in many a gathering twine,

They swell a hundred brooks.

A hundred brooks, and still they run

With ripple, shade, and gleam,

Till, clustering all their braids in one,

They flow a single stream.

A bracelet spun from mountain mist,

A silvery sash unwound,

With ox-bow curve and sinuous twist

It writhes to reach the Sound.

This is my bark,— a pygmy's ship;

Beneath a child it rolls;

Fear not,— one body makes it dip,

But not a thousand souls.

Float we the grassy banks between;

Without an oar we glide;

The meadows, drest in living green,

Unroll on either side.

Come, take the book we love so well,

And let us read and dream

We see whate'er its pages tell,

And sail an English stream.

Up to the clouds the lark has sprung,

Still trilling as he flies;

The linnet sings as there he sung;

The unseen cuckoo cries,

And daisies strew the banks along,

And yellow kingcups shine,

With cowslips, and a primrose throng,

And humble celandine.

Ah foolish dream! when Nature nursed

Her daughter in the West,

The fount was drained that opened first;

She bared her other breast.

On the young planet's orient shore

Her morning hand she tried;

Then turned the broad medallion o'er

And stamped the sunset side.

Take what she gives, her pine's tall stem,

Her elm with hanging spray;

She wears her mountain diadem

Still in her own proud way.

Look on the forests’ ancient kings,

The hemlock's towering pride

Yon trunk had thrice a hundred rings,

And fell before it died.

Nor think that Nature saves her bloom

And slights our grassy plain;

For us she wears her court costume,—

Look on its broidered train;

The lily with the sprinkled dots,

Brands of the noontide beam;

The cardinal, and the blood-red spots,

Its double in the stream,

As if some wounded eagle's breast,

Slow throbbing o'er the plain,

Had left its airy path impressed

In drops of scarlet rain.

And hark! and hark! the woodland rings;

There thrilled the thrush's soul;

And look! that flash of flamy wings,—

The fire-plumed oriole!

Above, the hen-hawk swims and swoops,

Flung from the bright, blue sky;

Below, the robin hops, and whoops

His piercing, Indian cry.

Beauty runs virgin in the woods

Robed in her rustic green,

And oft a longing thought intrudes,

As if we might have seen.

Her every finger's every joint

Ringed with some golden line,

Poet whom Nature did anoint

Had our wild home been thine.

Yet think not so; Old England's blood

Runs warm in English veins;

But wafted o'er the icy flood

Its better life remains.

Our children know each wildwood smell,

The bayberry and the fern,

The man who does not know them well

Is all too old to learn.

Be patient! On the breathing page

Still pants our hurried past;

Pilgrim and soldier, saint and sage,

The poet comes the last!

Though still the lark-voiced matins ring

The world has known so long;

The wood-thrush of the West shall sing

Earth's last sweet even-song!