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Translated by J. Bowring
A BALMY air is up, the night is still, | |
| The tired steeds graze upon the watery meads; | |
| The willows bend their branches o’er the rill | |
| That angrily breaks through the impeding weeds. | |
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| The field is silent,—but that echoes lone, | 5 |
| Roused by the swain from the dark cells awake; | |
| The shifting clouds sweep o’er the steadfast moon, | |
| Who shoots her silver arrows o’er the lake. | |
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| Sweet moon! now watching yon fair conclave o’er, | |
| Not brightly thus thy pure and pale lamp shone, | 10 |
| When war’s black smoke had veiled thee; and its roar | |
| Rolled through the neighboring woods the deathful groan. | |
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| Then fled the villager his burning shed; | |
| The shrieking babes clung to their mothers’ breast, | |
| Drums, clarions, cannon’s thundering; and the dead | 15 |
| And tortured dying. Now, ’t is all at rest. | |
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| Where the blood flowed, now gleams the falling dew; | |
| The green grass grows, the grateful balmy hay | |
| Is gathered in;—the laboring ox anew | |
| Ploughs for fresh harvests on his wonted way. | 20 |
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| But all these mounds are tombs! the wild winds pass | |
| Mournfully, murmuring sorrow as they go; | |
| The cicades have left the close-mown grass | |
| To sing their songs of exile and of woe. | |
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| Sad memory! the spirits of the dead | 25 |
| Flit by me; shade is hurried after shade. | |
| Here mangled corses lift their ghastly head, | |
| There shadowy arms wave high the gleaming blade. | |
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| But what dim shade is that, where sits the bird | |
| Of evening on the pensive alder-tree! | 30 |
| O’er rustling piles of armor sure I heard | |
| Him stalk; the wind wakes his harp’s harmony. | |
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| Shades of the friends I loved! how long, how long | |
| Will ye in bloody garments haunt this spot; | |
| Around the tombs where sleep our fathers throng | 35 |
| Clamoring for vengeance? Ah! we hear ye not. | |
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