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| SWEET village! on thy pastoral hill | |
| Arrayed in sunlight sad and still, | |
| As if beneath the harvest-moon, | |
| Thy noiseless homes were sleeping! | |
| It is the merry month of June, | 5 |
| And creatures all of air and earth | |
| Should now their holiday of mirth | |
| With dance and song be keeping. | |
| But, loveliest village! silent thou, | |
| As cloud wreathed o’er the morning’s brow, | 10 |
| When light is faintly breaking, | |
| And midnight’s voice afar is lost, | |
| Like the wailing of a wearied ghost, | |
| The shades of earth forsaking. * * * * * | |
| Sweet Woodburn! like a cloud that name | 15 |
| Comes floating o’er my soul! | |
| Although thy beauty still survive, | |
| One look hath changed the whole. | |
| The gayest village of the gay | |
| Beside thy own sweet river, | 20 |
| Wert thou on week or Sabbath day! | |
| So bathed in the blue light of joy, | |
| As if no trouble could destroy | |
| Peace doomed to last forever. | |
| Now in the shadow of thy trees | 25 |
| Still lovely in the tainted breeze, | |
| The fell plague-spirit grimly lies | |
| And broods, as in despite | |
| Of uncomplaining lifelessness, | |
| On the troops of silent shades that press | 30 |
| Into the churchyard’s cold recess, | |
| From that region of delight. | |
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| Last summer from the school-house door, | |
| When the glad play-bell was ringing, | |
| What shoals of bright-haired elves would pour, | 35 |
| Like small waves racing on the shore, | |
| In dance of rapture singing! | |
| Oft by yon little silver well, | |
| Now sleeping in neglected cell, | |
| The village maid would stand, | 40 |
| While resting on the mossy bank | |
| With freshened soul the traveller drank | |
| The cold cup from her hand; | |
| Haply some soldier from the war, | |
| Who would remember long and far | 45 |
| That lily of the land. | |
| And still the green is bright with flowers, | |
| And dancing through the sunny hours, | |
| Like blossoms from enchanted bowers | |
| On a sudden wafted by, | 50 |
| Obedient to the changeful air, | |
| And proudly feeling they are fair, | |
| Glide bird and butterfly. | |
| But where is the tiny hunter-rout | |
| That revelled on with dance and shout | 55 |
| Against their airy prey? | |
| Alas! the fearless linnet sings, | |
| And the bright insect folds its wings | |
| Upon the dewy flower that springs | |
| Above these children’s clay. | 60 |
| And if to yon deserted well | |
| Some solitary maid, | |
| As she was wont at eve, should go, | |
| There silent as her shade | |
| She stands awhile, then sad and slow | 65 |
| Walks home, afraid to think | |
| Of many a loudly laughing ring | |
| That dipped their pitchers in that spring, | |
| And lingered round its brink. * * * * * | |
| Sweet spire, that crown’st the house of God! | 70 |
| To thee my spirit turns, | |
| While through a cloud the softened light | |
| On thy yellow dial burns. | |
| Ah me! my bosom inly bleeds | |
| To see the deep-worn path that leads | 75 |
| Unto that open gate! | |
| In silent blackness it doth tell | |
| How oft thy little sullen bell | |
| Hath o’er the village tolled its knell, | |
| In beauty desolate. | 80 |
| Oft, wandering by myself at night, | |
| Such spire hath risen in softened light | |
| Before my gladdened eyes, | |
| And as I looked around to see | |
| The village sleeping quietly | 85 |
| Beneath the quiet skies, | |
| Methought that mid her stars so bright, | |
| The moon in placid mirth, | |
| Was not in heaven a holier sight | |
| Than God’s house on the earth. | 90 |
| Sweet image, transient in my soul! | |
| That very bell hath ceased to toll | |
| When the grave receives its dead, | |
| And the last time it slowly swung, | |
| ’T was by a dying stripling rung | 95 |
| O’er the sexton’s hoary head! | |
| All silent now from cot or hall | |
| Comes forth the sable funeral. | |
| The pastor is not there! | |
| For yon sweet manse now empty stands, | 100 |
| Nor in its walls will holier hands | |
| Be e’er held up in prayer. | |
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