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(From The Recollection)
* * * * * WE wandered to the Pine Forest | |
| That skirts the Ocean’s foam, | |
| The lightest wind was in its nest, | |
| The tempest in its home. | |
| The whispering waves were half asleep, | 5 |
| The clouds were gone to play, | |
| And on the bosom of the deep | |
| The smile of Heaven lay; | |
| It seemed as if the hour were one | |
| Sent from beyond the skies, | 10 |
| Which scattered from above the sun | |
| A light of Paradise. | |
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| We paused amid the pines that stood | |
| The giants of the waste, | |
| Tortured by storms to shapes as rude | 15 |
| As serpents interlaced, | |
| And soothed by every azure breath | |
| That under heaven is blown, | |
| To harmonies and hues beneath, | |
| As tender as its own; | 20 |
| Now all the tree-tops lay asleep, | |
| Like green waves on the sea, | |
| As still as in the silent deep | |
| The ocean woods may be. | |
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| How calm it was!—the silence there | 25 |
| By such a chain was bound, | |
| That even the busy woodpecker | |
| Made stiller by her sound | |
| The inviolable quietness; | |
| The breath of peace we drew | 30 |
| With its soft motion made not less | |
| The calm that round us grew. | |
| There seemed from the remotest seat | |
| Of the wide mountain waste, | |
| To the soft flower beneath our feet, | 35 |
| A magic circle traced; | |
| A spirit interfused around | |
| A thrilling silent life, | |
| To momentary peace it bound | |
| Our mortal nature’s strife;— | 40 |
| And still I felt the centre of | |
| The magic circle there | |
| Was one fair form that filled with love | |
| The lifeless atmosphere. | |
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| We paused beside the pools that lie | 45 |
| Under the forest bough, | |
| Each seemed as ’t were a little sky | |
| Gulfed in a world below; | |
| A firmament of purple light, | |
| Which in the dark earth lay, | 50 |
| More boundless than the depth of night, | |
| And purer than the day; | |
| In which the lovely forests grew, | |
| As in the upper air, | |
| More perfect both in shape and hue | 55 |
| Than any spreading there. | |
| There lay the glade and neighboring lawn, | |
| And through the dark green wood | |
| The white sun twinkling like the dawn | |
| Out of a speckled cloud. | 60 |
| Sweet views, which in our world above | |
| Can never well be seen, | |
| Were imaged by the water’s love | |
| Of that fair forest green. | |
| And all was interfused beneath | 65 |
| With an Elysian glow, | |
| An atmosphere without a breath, | |
| A softer day below. | |
| Like one beloved the scene had lent | |
| To the dark water’s breast | 70 |
| Its every leaf and lineament | |
| With more than truth exprest, | |
| Until an envious wind crept by, | |
| Like an unwelcome thought, | |
| Which from the mind’s too faithful eye | 75 |
| Blots one dear image out. * * * * * | |
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