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SING, Poet, t is a merry world; | |
That cottage smoke is rolled and curled | |
In sport, that every moss | |
Is happy, every inch of soil; | |
Before me runs a road of toil | 5 |
With my grave cut across. | |
Sing, trailing showers and breezy downs, | |
I know the tragic hearts of towns. | |
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City! I am true son of thine; | |
Neer dwelt I where great mornings shine | 10 |
Around the bleating pens; | |
Neer by the rivulets I strayed, | |
And neer upon my childhood weighed | |
The silence of the glens. | |
Instead of shores where ocean beats, | 15 |
I hear the ebb and flow of streets. | |
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Black Labor draws his weary waves | |
Into their secret-moaning caves; | |
But with the morning light | |
That sea again will overflow | 20 |
With a long, weary sound of woe, | |
Again to faint in night. | |
Wave am I in that sea of woes, | |
Which, night and morning, ebbs and flows. | |
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I dwelt within a gloomy court, | 25 |
Wherein did never sunbeam sport; | |
Yet there my heart was stirred, | |
My very blood did dance and thrill, | |
When on my narrow window-sill | |
Spring lighted like a bird. | 30 |
Poor flowers! I watched them pine for weeks, | |
With leaves as pale as human cheeks. | |
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Afar, one summer, I was borne; | |
Through golden vapors of the morn | |
I heard the hills of sheep: | 35 |
I trod with a wild ecstasy | |
The bright fringe of the living sea: | |
And on a ruined keep | |
I sat and watched an endless plain | |
Blacken beneath the gloom of rain. | 40 |
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O, fair the lightly sprinkled waste, | |
Oer which a laughing shower has raced! | |
O, fair the April shoots! | |
O, fair the woods on summer days, | |
While a blue hyacinthine haze | 45 |
Is dreaming round the roots! | |
In thee, O city! I discern | |
Another beauty, sad and stem. | |
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Draw thy fierce streams of blinding ore, | |
Smite on a thousand anvils, roar | 50 |
Down to the harbor-bars; | |
Smoulder in smoky sunsets, flare | |
On rainy nights, while street and square | |
Lie empty to the stars. | |
From terrace proud to alley base, | 55 |
I know thee as my mothers face. | |
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When sunset bathes thee in his gold, | |
In wreaths of bronze thy sides are rolled, | |
Thy smoke is dusty fire; | |
And from the glory round thee poured, | 60 |
A sunbeam like an angels sword | |
Shivers upon a spire. | |
Thus have I watched thee, Terror! Dream! | |
While the blue Night crept up the stream. | |
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The wild train plunges in the hills, | 65 |
He shrieks across the midnight rills; | |
Streams through the shifting glare, | |
The roar and flap of foundry fires, | |
That shake with light the sleeping shires; | |
And on the moorlands bare | 70 |
He sees afar a crown of light | |
Hang oer thee in the hollow night. | |
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At midnight, when thy suburbs lie | |
As silent as a noonday sky | |
When larks with heat are mute, | 75 |
I love to linger on thy bridge, | |
All lonely as a mountain ridge, | |
Disturbed but by my foot; | |
While the black lazy stream beneath | |
Steals from its far-off wilds of heath. | 80 |
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And through thy heart, as through a dream, | |
Flows on that black disdainful stream; | |
All scornfully it flows, | |
Between the huddled gloom of masts, | |
Silent as pines unvexed by blasts, | 85 |
Tween lamps in streaming rows, | |
O wondrous sight! O stream of dread! | |
O long, dark river of the dead! | |
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Afar the banner of the year | |
Unfurls: but dimly prisoned here, | 90 |
T is only when I greet | |
A dropt rose lying in my way, | |
A butterfly that flutters gay | |
Athwart the noisy street, | |
I know the happy Summer smiles | 95 |
Around thy suburbs, miles on miles. | |
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T were neither pæan now, nor dirge, | |
The flash and thunder of the surge | |
On flat sands wide and bare: | |
No haunting joy or anguish dwells, | 100 |
In the green light of sunny dells, | |
Or in the starry air. | |
Alike to me the desert flower, | |
The rainbow laughing oer the shower. | |
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While oer thy walls the darkness sails, | 105 |
I lean against the churchyard rails; | |
Up in the midnight towers | |
The belfried spire, the street is dead, | |
I hear in silence overhead | |
The clang of iron hours: | 110 |
It moves me not,I know her tomb | |
Is yonder in the shapeless gloom. | |
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All raptures of this mortal breath, | |
Solemnities of life and death, | |
Dwell in thy noise alone: | 115 |
Of me thou hast become a part, | |
Some kindred with my human heart | |
Lives in thy streets of stone; | |
For we have been familiar more | |
Than galley-slave and weary oar. | 120 |
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The beech is dipped in wine; the shower | |
Is burnished; on the swinging flower | |
The latest bee doth sit. | |
The low sun stares through dust of gold, | |
And oer the darkening heath and wold | 125 |
The large ghost-moth doth flit. | |
In every orchard Autumn stands, | |
With apples in his golden hands. | |
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But all these sights and sounds are strange; | |
Then wherefore from thee should I range? | 130 |
Thou hast my kith and kin; | |
My childhood, youth, and manhood brave; | |
Thou hast that unforgotten grave | |
Within thy central din. | |
A sacredness of love and death | 135 |
Dwells in thy noise and smoky breath. | |
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