Chapter 2

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 poisonous ivies, red-bunched elderberries, And pièd blossoms to the heart's desire, Gray mullein towering into yellow bloom, Pink-tasseled milkweed, breathing dense perfume, And swarthy vervain, tipped with violet fire.

To hear at eve the bleating of far flocks, The mud-hen's whistle from the marsh at morn; To skirt with deafened ears and brain o'erborne Some foam-filled rapid charging down its rocks With iron roar of waters; far away Across wide-reeded meres, pensive with noon, To hear the querulous outcry of the loon; To lie among deep rocks, and watch all day On liquid heights the snowy clouds melt by; Or hear from wood-capped mountain-brows the jay Pierce the bright morning with his jibing cry.

To feast on summer sounds; the jolted wains, The thrasher humming from the farm near by, The prattling cricket's intermittent cry, The locust's rattle from the sultry lanes; Or in the shadow of some oaken spray, To watch, as through a mist of light and dreams, The far-off hay-fields, where the dusty teams Drive round and round the lessening squares of hay, And hear upon the wind, now loud, now low, With drowsy cadence half a summer's day, The clatter of the reapers come and go.

Far violet hills, horizons filmed with showers, The murmur of cool streams, the forest's gloom, The voices of the breathing grass, the hum Of ancient gardens overbanked with flowers: Thus, with a smile as golden as the dawn, And cool fair fingers radiantly divine, The mighty mother brings us in her hand, For all tired eyes and foreheads pinched and wan, Her restful cup, her beaker of bright wine: Drink, and be filled, and ye shall understand!

AT THE FERRY

On such a day the shrunken stream Spends its last water and runs dry; Clouds like far turrets in a dream Stand baseless in the burning sky. On such a day at every rod The toilers in the hay-field halt, With dripping brows, and the parched sod Yields to the crushing foot like salt.

But here a little wind astir, Seen waterward in jetting lines, From yonder hillside topped with fir Comes pungent with the breath of pines; And here when all the noon hangs still, White-hot upon the city tiles, A perfume and a wintry chill Breathe from the yellow lumber-piles.

And all day long there falls a blur Of noises upon listless ears, The rumble of the trams, the stir Of barges at the clacking piers; The champ of wheels, the crash of steam, And ever, without change or stay, The drone, as through a troubled dream, Of waters falling far away.

A tug-boat up the farther shore Half pants, half whistles, in her draught; The cadence of a creaking oar Falls drowsily; a corded raft Creeps slowly in the noonday gleam, And wheresoe'er a shadow sleeps The men lie by, or half a-dream, Stand leaning at the idle sweeps.

And all day long in the quiet bay The eddying amber depths retard, And hold, as in a ring, at play, The heavy saw-logs notched and scarred; And yonder between cape and shoal, Where the long currents swing and shift, An aged punt-man with his pole Is searching in the parted drift.

At moments from the distant glare The murmur of a railway steals Round yonder jutting point the air Is beaten with the puff of wheels; And here at hand an open mill, Strong clamor at perpetual drive, With changing chant, now hoarse, now shrill, Keeps dinning like a mighty hive.

A furnace over field and mead, The rounding noon hangs hard and white; Into the gathering heats recede The hollows of the Chelsea height; But under all to one quiet tune, A spirit in cool depths withdrawn, With logs, and dust, and wrack bestrewn, The stately river journeys on.

I watch the swinging currents go Far down to where, enclosed and piled, The logs crowd, and the Gatineau Comes rushing from the northern wild. I see the long low point, where close The shore-lines, and the waters end, I watch the barges pass in rows That vanish at the tapering bend.

I see as at the noon's pale core-- A shadow that lifts clear and floats-- The cabin'd village round the shore, The landing and the fringe of boats; Faint films of smoke that curl and wreathe, And upward with the like desire The vast gray church that seems to breathe In heaven with its dreaming spire.

And there the last blue boundaries rise, That guard within their compass furled This plot of earth: beyond them lies The mystery of the echoing world; And still my thought goes on, and yields New vision and new joy to me, Far peopled hills, and ancient fields, And cities by the crested sea.

I see no more the barges pass, Nor mark the ripple round the pier, And all the uproar, mass on mass, Falls dead upon a vacant ear. Beyond the tumult of the mills, And all the city's sound and strife, Beyond the waste, beyond the hills, I look far out and dream of life.

SEPTEMBER

Now hath the summer reached her golden close, And, lost amid her corn-fields, bright of soul, Scarcely perceives from her divine repose How near, how swift, the inevitable goal: Still, still, she smiles, though from her careless feet The bounty and the fruitful strength are gone, And through the soft long wondering days goes on The silent sere decadence sad and sweet.

The kingbird and the pensive thrush are fled, Children of light, too fearful of the gloom; The sun falls low, the secret word is said, The mouldering woods grow silent as the tomb; Even the fields have lost their sovereign grace, The cone-flower and the marguerite; and no more, Across the river's shadow-haunted floor, The paths of skimming swallows interlace.

Already in the outland wilderness The forests echo with unwonted dins; In clamorous gangs the gathering woodmen press Northward, and the stern winter's toil begins. Around the long low shanties, whose rough lines Break the sealed dreams of many an unnamed lake, Already in the frost-clear morns awake The crash and thunder of the falling pines.

Where the tilled earth, with all its fields set free, Naked and yellow from the harvest lies, By many a loft and busy granary, The hum and tumult of the thrashers rise; There the tanned farmers labor without slack, Till twilight deepens round the spouting mill, Feeding the loosened sheaves, or with fierce will, Pitching waist-deep upon the dusty stack.

Still a brief while, ere the old year quite pass, Our wandering steps and wistful eyes shall greet The leaf, the water, the beloved grass; Still from these haunts and this accustomed seat I see the wood-wrapt city, swept with light, The blue long-shadowed distance, and, between, The dotted farm-lands with their parcelled green, The dark pine forest and the watchful height.

I see the broad rough meadow stretched away Into the crystal sunshine, wastes of sod, Acres of withered vervain, purple-gray, Branches of aster, groves of goldenrod; And yonder, toward the sunlit summit, strewn With shadowy boulders, crowned and swathed with weed, Stand ranks of silken thistles, blown to seed, Long silver fleeces shining like the noon.

In far-off russet corn-fields, where the dry Gray shocks stand peaked and withering, half concealed In the rough earth, the orange pumpkins lie, Full-ribbed; and in the windless pasture-field The sleek red horses o'er the sun-warmed ground Stand pensively about in companies, While all around them from the motionless trees The long clean shadows sleep without a sound.

Under cool elm-trees floats the distant stream, Moveless as air; and o'er the vast warm earth The fathomless daylight seems to stand and dream, A liquid cool elixir--all its girth Bound with faint haze, a frail transparency, Whose lucid purple barely veils and fills The utmost valleys and the thin last hills, Nor mars one whit their perfect clarity.

Thus without grief the golden days go by, So soft we scarcely notice how they wend, And like a smile half happy, or a sigh, The summer passes to her quiet end; And soon, too soon, around the cumbered eaves Sly frosts shall take the creepers by surprise, And through the wind-touched reddening woods shall rise October with the rain of ruined leaves.

A RE-ASSURANCE

With what doubting eyes, oh sparrow, Thou regardest me, Underneath yon spray of yarrow, Dipping cautiously.

Fear me not, oh little sparrow, Bathe and never fear, For to me both pool and yarrow And thyself are dear.

THE POET'S POSSESSION

Think not, oh master of the well-tilled field, This earth is only thine; for after thee, When all is sown and gathered and put by, Comes the grave poet with creative eye, And from these silent acres and clean plots, Bids with his wand the fancied after-yield, A second tilth and second harvest, be, The crop of images and curious thoughts.

AN AUTUMN LANDSCAPE

No wind there is that either pipes or moans; The fields are cold and still; the sky Is covered with a blue-gray sheet Of motionless cloud; and at my feet The river, curling softly by, Whispers and dimples round its quiet gray stones.

Along the chill green slope that dips and heaves The road runs rough and silent, lined With plum-trees, misty and blue-gray, And poplars pallid as the day, In masses spectral, undefined, Pale greenish stems half hid in dry gray leaves.

And on beside the river's sober edge A long fresh field lies black. Beyond, Low thickets gray and reddish stand, Stroked white with birch; and near at hand, Over a little steel-smooth pond, Hang multitudes of thin and withering sedge.

Across a waste and solitary rise A ploughman urges his dull team, A stooped gray figure with prone brow That plunges bending to the plough With strong, uneven steps. The stream Rings and re-echoes with his furious cries.

Sometimes the lowing of a cow, long-drawn, Comes from far off; and crows in strings Pass on the upper silences. A flock of small gray goldfinches, Flown down with silvery twitterings, Rustle among the birch-cones and are gone.

This day the season seems like one that heeds, With fixèd ear and lifted hand, All moods that yet are known on earth, All motions that have faintest birth, If haply she may understand The utmost inward sense of all her deeds.

IN NOVEMBER

With loitering step and quiet eye, Beneath the low November sky, I wandered in the woods, and found A clearing, where the broken ground Was scattered with black stumps and briers, And the old wreck of forest fires. It was a bleak and sandy spot, And, all about, the vacant plot Was peopled and inhabited By scores of mulleins long since dead. A silent and forsaken brood In that mute opening of the wood, So shrivelled and so thin they were, So gray, so haggard, and austere, Not plants at all they seemed to me, But rather some spare company Of hermit folk, who long ago, Wandering in bodies to and fro, Had chanced upon this lonely way, And rested thus, till death one day Surprised them at their compline prayer, And left them standing lifeless there.

There was no sound about the wood Save the wind's secret stir. I stood Among the mullein-stalks as still As if myself had grown to be One of their sombre company, A body without wish or will. And as I stood, quite suddenly, Down from a furrow in the sky The sun shone out a little space Across that silent sober place, Over the sand heaps and brown sod, The mulleins and dead goldenrod, And passed beyond the thickets gray, And lit the fallen leaves that lay, Level and deep within the wood, A rustling yellow multitude.

And all around me the thin light, So sere, so melancholy bright, Fell like the half-reflected gleam Or shadow of some former dream; A moment's golden revery Poured out on every plant and tree A semblance of weird joy, or less, A sort of spectral happiness; And I, too, standing idly there, With muffled hands in the chill air, Felt the warm glow about my feet, And shuddering betwixt cold and heat, Drew my thoughts closer, like a cloak, While something in my blood awoke, A nameless and unnatural cheer, A pleasure secret and austere.

BY AN AUTUMN STREAM

Now overhead, Where the rivulet loiters and stops, The bittersweet hangs from the tops Of the alders and cherries Its bunches of beautiful berries, Orange and red.

And the snowbirds flee, Tossing up on the far brown field, Now flashing and now concealed, Like fringes of spray That vanish and gleam on the gray Field of the sea.

Flickering light, Come the last of the leaves down borne, And patches of pale white corn In the wind complain, Like the slow rustle of rain Noticed by night.

Withered and thinned, The sentinel mullein looms, With the pale gray shadowy plumes Of the goldenrod; And the milkweed opens its pod, Tempting the wind.

Aloft on the hill, A cloudrift opens and shines Through a break in its gorget of pines, And it dreams at my feet In a sad, silvery sheet, Utterly still.

All things that be Seem plunged into silence, distraught, By some stern, some necessitous thought: It wraps and enthralls Marsh, meadow, and forest; and falls Also on me.

SNOWBIRDS

Along the narrow sandy height I watch them swiftly come and go, Or round the leafless wood, Like flurries of wind-driven snow, Revolving in perpetual flight, A changing multitude.

Nearer and nearer still they sway, And, scattering in a circled sweep, Rush down without a sound; And now I see them peer and peep, Across yon level bleak and gray, Searching the frozen ground,--

Until a little wind upheaves, And makes a sudden rustling there, And then they drop their play, Flash up into the sunless air, And like a flight of silver leaves Swirl round and sweep away.

SNOW

White are the far-off plains, and white The fading forests grow; The wind dies out along the height, And denser still the snow, A gathering weight on roof and tree, Falls down scarce audibly.

The road before me smooths and fills Apace, and all about The fences dwindle, and the hills Are blotted slowly out; The naked trees loom spectrally Into the dim white sky.

The meadows and far-sheeted streams Lie still without a sound; Like some soft minister of dreams The snow-fall hoods me round; In wood and water, earth and air, A silence everywhere.

Save when at lonely intervals Some farmer's sleigh, urged on, With rustling runners and sharp bells, Swings by me and is gone; Or from the empty waste I hear A sound remote and clear;

The barking of a dog, or call To cattle, sharply pealed, Borne echoing from some wayside stall Or barnyard far a-field; Then all is silent, and the snow Falls, settling soft and slow.

The evening deepens, and the gray Folds closer earth and sky; The world seems shrouded far away; Its noises sleep, and I, As secret as yon buried stream, Plod dumbly on, and dream.

SUNSET

From this windy bridge at rest, In some former curious hour, We have watched the city's hue, All along the orange west, Cupola and pointed tower, Darken into solid blue.

Tho' the biting north wind breaks Full across this drifted hold, Let us stand with icèd cheeks Watching westward as of old;

Past the violet mountain-head To the farthest fringe of pine, Where far off the purple-red Narrows to a dusky line, And the last pale splendors die Slowly from the olive sky;

Till the thin clouds wear away Into threads of purple-gray, And the sudden stars between Brighten in the pallid green;

Till above the spacious east, Slow returnèd one by one, Like pale prisoners released From the dungeons of the sun, Capella and her train appear In the glittering Charioteer;

Till the rounded moon shall grow Great above the eastern snow, Shining into burnished gold; And the silver earth outrolled, In the misty yellow light, Shall take on the width of night.

WINTER-STORE

Subtly conscious, all awake, Let us clear our eyes, and break Through the cloudy chrysalis, See the wonder as it is. Down a narrow alley, blind, Touch and vision, heart and mind; Turned sharply inward, still we plod, Till the calmly smiling god Leaves us, and our spirits grow More thin, more acrid, as we go. Creeping by the sullen wall, We forego the power to see, The threads that bind us to the All, God or the Immensity; Whereof on the eternal road Man is but a passing mode.

Too blind we are, too little see Of the magic pageantry, Every minute, every hour, From the cloudflake to the flower, Forever old, forever strange, Issuing in perpetual change From the rainbow gates of Time.

But he who through this common air Surely knows the great and fair, What is lovely, what sublime, Becomes in an increasing span, One with earth and one with man, One, despite these mortal scars, With the planets and the stars; And Nature from her holy place, Bending with unveilèd face, Fills him in her divine employ With her own majestic joy.

Up the fielded slopes at morn, Where light wefts of shadow pass, Films upon the bending corn, I shall sweep the purple grass. Sun-crowned heights and mossy woods, And the outer solitudes, Mountain-valleys, dim with pine, Shall be home and haunt of mine. I shall search in crannied hollows, Where the sunlight scarcely follows, And the secret forest brook Murmurs, and from nook to nook Forever downward curls and cools, Frothing in the bouldered pools.

Many a noon shall find me laid In the pungent balsam shade, Where sharp breezes spring and shiver On some deep rough-coasted river, And the plangent waters come, Amber-hued and streaked with foam; Where beneath the sunburnt hills All day long the crowded mills With remorseless champ and scream Overlord the sluicing stream, And the rapids' iron roar Hammers at the forest's core; Where corded rafts creep slowly on, Glittering in the noonday sun, And the tawny river-dogs, Shepherding the branded logs, Bind and heave with cadenced cry; Where the blackened tugs go by, Panting hard and straining slow, Laboring at the weighty tow, Flat-nosed barges all in trim, Creeping in long cumbrous line, Loaded to the water's brim With the clean, cool-scented pine.