It fluttered here and there, nor swept in vain
  The dusty haunts where futile echoes dwell,—­
Then, in a cadence soft as summer rain,
  And sad from Auburn voiceless, drooped and fell.

It drooped and fell, and one ’neath northern skies,
  With southern heart, who tilled his father’s field,
Found Poesy a-dying, bade her rise
  And touch quick nature’s hem and go forth healed.

On life’s broad plain the ploughman’s conquering share
  Upturned the fallow lands of truth anew,
And o’er the formal garden’s trim parterre
  The peasant’s team a ruthless furrow drew.

Bright was his going forth, but clouds ere long
  Whelmed him; in gloom his radiance set, and those
Twin morning stars of the new century’s song,
  Those morning stars that sang together, rose.

In elvish speech the Dreamer told his tale
  Of marvellous oceans swept by fateful wings.—­
The Seer strayed not from earth’s human pale,
  But the mysterious face of common things

He mirrored as the moon in Rydal Mere
  Is mirrored, when the breathless night hangs blue: 
Strangely remote she seems and wondrous near,
  And by some nameless difference born anew.

V

Peace—­peace—­and rest!  Ah, how the lyre is loth,
  Or powerless now, to give what all men seek! 
Either it deadens with ignoble sloth
  Or deafens with shrill tumult, loudly weak.

Where is the singer whose large notes and clear
  Can heal and arm and plenish and sustain? 
Lo, one with empty music floods the ear,
  And one, the heart refreshing, tires the brain.

And idly tuneful, the loquacious throng
  Flutter and twitter, prodigal of time,
And little masters make a toy of song
  Till grave men weary of the sound of rhyme.

And some go prankt in faded antique dress,
  Abhorring to be hale and glad and free;
And some parade a conscious naturalness,
  The scholar’s not the child’s simplicity.

Enough;—­and wisest who from words forbear. 
  The kindly river rails not as it glides;
And suave and charitable, the winning air
  Chides not at all, or only him who chides.

VI

Nature! we storm thine ear with choric notes. 
  Thou answerest through the calm great nights and days,
“Laud me who will:  not tuneless are your throats;
  Yet if ye paused I should not miss the praise.”

We falter, half-rebuked, and sing again. 
  We chant thy desertness and haggard gloom,
Or with thy splendid wrath inflate the strain,
  Or touch it with thy colour and perfume.

One, his melodious blood aflame for thee,
  Wooed with fierce lust, his hot heart world-defiled. 
One, with the upward eye of infancy,
  Looked in thy face, and felt himself thy child.