Excerpt
THE HOLLOW. I. Fleet swallows soared and darted'Neath empty vaults of blue;Thick leaves close clung or partedTo let the sunlight through;Each wild rose, honey-hearted,Bowed full of living dew. II. Down deep, fair fields of Heaven,Beat wafts of air and balm,From southmost islands drivenAnd continents of calm;Bland winds by which were givenHid hints of rustling palm. III. High birds soared high to hover;Thick leaves close clung to slip;Wild rose and snowy cloverWere warm for winds to dip,And one ungentle lover,A bee with robber lip. IV. Dart on, O buoyant swallow!Kiss leaves and willing rose!Whose musk the sly winds follow,And bee that booming goes;—But in this quiet hollowI'll walk, which no one knows. V. None save the moon that shinethAt night through rifted trees;The lonely flower that twinethFrail blooms that no one sees;The whippoorwill that pineth;The sad, sweet-swaying breeze; VI. The lone white stars that glitter;The stream's complaining wave;Gray bats that dodge and flitter;Black crickets hid that rave;And me whose life is bitter,And one white head stone grave.
BY WOLD AND WOOD. I. Green, watery jets of light let throughThe rippling foliage drenched with dew;Bland glow-worm glamours warm and dimAbove the mystic vistas swim,Where, 'round the fountain's oozy urn,The limp, loose fronds of limber fernWave dusky tresses thin and wet,Blue-filleted with violet.O'er roots that writhe in snaky knotsThe moss in amber cushions clots;From wattled walls of brier and brushThe elder's misty attars gush;And, Argus-eyed, by knoll and bankThe affluent wild rose flowers rank;And stol'n in shadowy retreats,In black, rich soil, your vision greetsThe colder undergrowths of woods,Damp, lushy-leaved, whose gloomier moodsTurn all the life beneath to deathAnd rottenness for their own breath.May-apples waxen-stemmed and largeWith their bloom-screening breadths of targe;Wake robins dark-green leaved, their stemsTipped with green, oval clumps of gems,As if some woodland Bacchus thereA-braiding of his yellow hairWith ivy-tod had idly tostHis thyrsus there, and so had lost.Low blood root with its pallid bloom,The red life of its mother's wombThrough all its ardent pulses fineBeating in scarlet veins of wine.And where the knotty eyes of treesStare wide, like Fauns' at DryadesThat lave smooth limbs in founts of spar,Shines many a wild-flower's tender star. II. The scummy pond sleeps lazily,Clad thick with lilies, and the beeReels boisterous as a BassaridAbove the bloated green frog hidIn lush wan calamus and grass,Beside the water's stagnant glass.The piebald dragon-fly, like oneA-weary of the world and sun,Comes blindly blundering along,A pedagogue, gaunt, lean, and long,Large-headed naturalist with wise,Great, glaring goggles on his eyes.And dry and hot the fragrant mintPours grateful odors without stintFrom cool, clay banks of cressy streams,Rare as the musks of rich hareems,And hot as some sultana's breathWith turbulent passions or with death.A haze of floating saffron; soundOf shy, crisp creepings o'er the ground;The dip and stir of twig and leaf;Tempestuous gusts of spices briefFrom elder bosks and sassafras;Wind-cuffs that dodge the laughing grass;Sharp, sudden songs and whisperingsThat hint at untold hidden things,Pan and Sylvanus that of oldKept sacred each wild wood and wold.A wily light beneath the treesQuivers and dusks with ev'ry breeze;Mayhap some Hamadryad who,Culling her morning meal of dewFrom frail accustomed cups of flowers—Some Satyr watching through the bowers—Had, when his goat hoof snapped and pressedA brittle branch, shrunk back distressed,Startled, her wild, tumultuous hairBathing her limbs one instant there.
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