Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant Part 12

'Mong the deep-cloven fells that for ages had listened To the rush of the pebble-paved river between, Where the kingfisher screamed and gray precipice glistened, All breathless with awe have I gazed on the scene;

Till I felt the dark power o'er my reveries stealing, From the gloom of the thicket that over me hung, And the thoughts that awoke, in that rapture of feeling, Were formed into verse as they rose to my tongue.

Bright visions! I mixed with the world, and ye faded, No longer your pure rural wors.h.i.+pper now; In the haunts your continual presence pervaded, Ye shrink from the signet of care on my brow.

In the old mossy groves on the breast of the mountains, In deep lonely glens where the waters complain, By the shade of the rock, by the gush of the fountain, I seek your loved footsteps, but seek them in vain.

Oh, leave not forlorn and forever forsaken, Your pupil and victim to life and its tears!

But sometimes return, and in mercy awaken The glories ye showed to his earlier years.

TO A MOSQUITO.

Fair insect! that, with threadlike legs spread out, And blood-extracting bill and filmy wing, Dost murmur, as thou slowly sail'st about, In pitiless ears full many a plaintive thing, And tell how little our large veins would bleed, Would we but yield them to thy bitter need.

Unwillingly, I own, and, what is worse, Full angrily men hearken to thy plaint; Thou gettest many a brush, and many a curse, For saying thou art gaunt, and starved, and faint; Even the old beggar, while he asks for food, Would kill thee, hapless stranger, if he could.

I call thee stranger, for the town, I ween, Has not the honor of so proud a birth,-- Thou com'st from Jersey meadows, fresh and green, The offspring of the G.o.ds, though born on earth; For t.i.tan was thy sire, and fair was she, The ocean-nymph that nursed thy infancy.

Beneath the rushes was thy cradle swung, And when at length thy gauzy wings grew strong, Abroad to gentle airs their folds were flung, Rose in the sky and bore thee soft along; The south wind breathed to waft thee on the way, And danced and shone beneath the billowy bay.

Calm rose afar the city spires, and thence Came the deep murmur of its throng of men, And as its grateful odors met thy sense, They seemed the perfumes of thy native fen.

Fair lay its crowded streets, and at the sight Thy tiny song grew shriller with delight.

At length thy pinions fluttered in Broadway-- Ah, there were fairy steps, and white necks kissed By wanton airs, and eyes whose killing ray Shone through the snowy veils like stars through mist; And fresh as morn, on many a cheek and chin, Bloomed the bright blood through the transparent skin.

Sure these were sights to touch an anchorite!

What! do I hear thy slender voice complain?

Thou wailest when I talk of beauty's light, As if it brought the memory of pain: Thou art a wayward being--well--come near, And pour thy tale of sorrow in my ear.

What sayest thou--slanderer!--rouge makes thee sick?

And China bloom at best is sorry food?

And Rowland's Kalydor, if laid on thick, Poisons the thirsty wretch that bores for blood?

Go! 'twas a just reward that met thy crime-- But shun the sacrilege another time.

That bloom was made to look at, not to touch; To wors.h.i.+p, not approach, that radiant white; And well might sudden vengeance light on such As dared, like thee, most impiously to bite.

Thou shouldst have gazed at distance and admired, Murmured thy adoration, and retired.

Thou'rt welcome to the town; but why come here To bleed a brother poet, gaunt like thee?

Alas! the little blood I have is dear, And thin will be the banquet drawn from me.

Look round--the pale-eyed sisters in my cell, Thy old acquaintance, Song and Famine, dwell.

Try some plump alderman, and suck the blood Enriched by generous wine and costly meat; On well-filled skins, sleek as thy native mud, Fix thy light pump and press thy freckled feet.

Go to the men for whom, in ocean's halls, The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls.

There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows To fill the swelling veins for thee, and now The ruddy cheek and now the ruddier nose Shall tempt thee, as thou flittest round the brow; And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings, No angry hands shall rise to brush thy wings.

LINES ON REVISITING THE COUNTRY.

I stand upon my native hills again, Broad, round, and green, that in the summer sky With garniture of waving gra.s.s and grain, Orchards, and beechen forests, basking lie, While deep the sunless glens are scooped between, Where brawl o'er shallow beds the streams unseen.

A lisping voice and glancing eyes are near, And ever-restless feet of one, who, now, Gathers the blossoms of her fourth bright year; There plays a gladness o'er her fair young brow As breaks the varied scene upon her sight, Upheaved and spread in verdure and in light.

For I have taught her, with delighted eye, To gaze upon the mountains,--to behold, With deep affection, the pure ample sky And clouds along its blue abysses rolled, To love the song of waters, and to hear The melody of winds with charmed ear.

Here, have I 'scaped the city's stifling heat, Its horrid sounds, and its polluted air, And, where the season's milder fervors beat, And gales, that sweep the forest borders, bear The song of bird and sound of running stream, Am come awhile to wander and to dream.

Ay, flame thy fiercest, sun! thou canst not wake, In this pure air, the plague that walks unseen.

The maize-leaf and the maple-bough but take, From thy strong heats, a deeper, glossier green.

The mountain wind, that faints not in thy ray, Sweeps the blue steams of pestilence away.

The mountain wind! most spiritual thing of all The wide earth knows; when, in the sultry tune, He stoops him from his vast cerulean hall, He seems the breath of a celestial clime!

As if from heaven's wide-open gates did flow Health and refreshment on the world below.

THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS.

The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sere.

Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn leaves lie dead; They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread; The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrubs the jay, And from the wood-top calls the crow through all the gloomy day.

Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprang and stood In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood?

Alas! they all are in their graves, the gentle race of flowers Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours.

The rain is falling where they lie, but the cold November rain Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again.

The wind-flower and the violet, they perished long ago, And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer glow; But on the hills the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood, And the yellow sun-flower by the brook in autumn beauty stood, Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men, And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland, glade, and glen.

And now, when comes the calm mild day, as still such days will come, To call the squirrel and the bee from out their winter home; When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees' added are still, And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the rill, The south wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late he bore, And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more.

And then I think of one who in her youthful beauty died, The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded by my side.

In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the forests cast the leaf, And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief: Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young friend of ours, So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers.

ROMERO.

When freedom, from the land of Spain, By Spain's degenerate sons was driven, Who gave their willing limbs again To wear the chain so lately riven; Romero broke the sword he wore-- "Go, faithful brand," the warrior said, "Go, undishonored, never more The blood of man shall make thee red.

I grieve for that already shed; And I am sick at heart to know, That faithful friend and n.o.ble foe Have only bled to make more strong The yoke that Spain has worn so long.