| |
| ONLY ten miles from the city,— | |
| And how I am lifted away | |
| To the peace that passeth knowing, | |
| And the light that is not of day! | |
| |
| All alone on the hill-top! | 5 |
| Nothing but God and me, | |
| And the spring-time’s resurrection, | |
| Far shinings of the sea, | |
| |
| The river’s laugh in the valley, | |
| Hills dreaming of their past; | 10 |
| And all things silently opening, | |
| Opening into the vast! | |
| |
| Eternities past and future | |
| Seem clinging to all I see, | |
| And things immortal cluster | 15 |
| Around my hended knee. | |
| |
| That pebble—is older than Adam! | |
| Secrets it hath to tell; | |
| These rocks—they cry out history, | |
| Could I but listen well. | 20 |
| |
| That pool knows the ocean-feeling | |
| Of storm and moon-led tide; | |
| The sun finds its east and west therein, | |
| And the stars find room to glide. | |
| |
| That lichen’s crinkled circle | 25 |
| Still creeps with the Life Divine, | |
| Where the Holy Spirit loitered | |
| On its way to this face of mine,— | |
| |
| On its way to the shining faces | |
| Where angel-lives are led; | 30 |
| And I am the lichen’s circle, | |
| That creeps with tiny tread. | |
| |
| I can hear these violets chorus | |
| To the sky’s benediction above; | |
| And we all are together lying | 35 |
| On the bosom of Infinite Love. | |
| |
| I—I am a part of the poem, | |
| Of its every sight and sound, | |
| For my heart beats inward rhymings | |
| To the Sabbath that lies around. | 40 |
| |
| Oh, the peace at the heart of Nature! | |
| Oh, the light that is not of day! | |
| Why seek it afar forever, | |
| When it cannot be lifted away? | |
| |
