Heaving with adoration! there
     The work of husbandry is done,
     And daily bread is daily earned;
     Nor seems there ought to indicate
     The springs which move in me such thoughts,
     But from my soul a spirit calls them up.

     All day into the open sky,
     All night to the eternal stars,
     For ever both at morn and eve
     Men mellow distances draw near,
     And shadows lengthen in the dusk,
     Athwart the heavens it rolls its glimmering line!

     When twilight from the dream-hued West
     Sighs hush! and all the land is still;
     When, from the lush empurpling East,
     The twilight of the crowing cock
     Peers on the drowsy village roofs,
     Athwart the heavens that glimmering line is seen.

     And now beneath the rising sun,
     Whose shining chariot overpeers
     The irradiate ridge, while fetlock deep
     In the rich soil his coursers plunge —
     How grand in robes of light it looks! 
     How glorious with rare suggestive grace!

     The ploughman mounting up the height
     Becomes a glowing shape, as though
     ’Twere young Triptolemus, plough in hand,
     While Ceres in her amber scarf
     With gentle love directs him how
     To wed the willing earth and hope for fruits!

     The furrows running up are fraught
     With meanings; there the goddess walks,
     While Proserpine is young, and there —
     ’Mid the late autumn sheaves, her voice
     Sobbing and choked with dumb despair —
     The nights will hear her wailing for her child!

     Whatever dim tradition tells,
     Whatever history may reveal,
     Or fancy, from her starry brows,
     Of light or dreamful lustre shed,
     Could not at this sweet time increase
     The quiet consecration of the spot.

     Blest with the sweat of labour, blest
     With the young sun’s first vigorous beams,
     Village hope and harvest prayer, —
     The heart that throbs beneath it holds
     A bliss so perfect in itself
     Men’s thoughts must borrow rather than bestow.

     III

     Now standing on this hedgeside path,
     Up which the evening winds are blowing
     Wildly from the lingering lines
     Of sunset o’er the hills;
     Unaided by one motive thought,
     My spirit with a strange impulsion
     Rises, like a fledgling,
     Whose wings are not mature, but still
     Supported by its strong desire
     Beats up its native air and leaves
     The tender mother’s nest.

     Great music under heaven is made,
     And in the track of rushing darkness
     Comes the solemn shape of night,
     And broods above the earth. 
     A thing of Nature am I now,
     Abroad, without a sense or feeling