1262. Quatrains by William Hamilton Hayne. Stedman, Edmund Clarence, ed. 1900. An American Anthology, 1787-1900

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

1262. Quatrains

By William Hamilton Hayne


MOONLIGHT SONG OF THE MOCKING-BIRD EACH golden note of music greets
The listening leaves, divinely stirred,
As if the vanished soul of Keats
Had found its new birth in a bird.

NIGHT MISTS SOMETIMES, when Nature falls asleep,	5
Around her woods and streams
The mists of night serenely creep—
For they are Nature’s dreams.

AN AUTUMN BREEZE THIS gentle and half melancholy breeze
Is but a wandering Hamlet of the trees,	10
Who finds a tongue in every lingering leaf
To voice some subtlety of sylvan grief.

EXILES HOPES grimly banished from the heart
Are the sad exiles that depart
To melancholy’s rayless goal,—	15
A bleak Siberia of the soul.