| |
| OVER this azure poplar glade | |
| The sunshine, fainting high above, | |
| Ebbs back from woolly clouds that move | |
| Like browsing lambs and cast no shade; | |
| And straight before me, faintly seen | 5 |
| Through emerald boughs that intervene, | |
| The visible sun turns white and weaves | |
| Long webs of silver through the leaves. | |
| The grassy sward beneath my foot | |
| Is soft as lips of lambs and beeves. | 10 |
| How cool those lilies at the root | |
| Of yonder tree, that dimly dance | |
| Through dews of their own radiance! | |
| |
| Yonder I see the river run, | |
| Half in the shade, half in the sun; | 15 |
| And as I near its rushy brink | |
| The sparkling minnows, where they lie | |
| With silver bellies to the sky, | |
| Flash from me in a shower and sink. | |
| I stand in shadows cool and sweet, | 20 |
| But in the mirror at my feet | |
| The heated azure heavens wink. | |
| |
| All round about this shaded spot, | |
| Whither the sunshine cometh not, | |
| Where all is beautiful repose,— | 25 |
| I know the kindled landskip glows; | |
| And further, flutter golden showers | |
| On proud Athenai white with towers, | |
| And catching from the murmurous sea | |
| (Stained with deep shadows as of flowers, | 30 |
| And darkening down to purple bowers | |
| Through which the sword-fish darts in glee), | |
| A strife that cometh not to me. | |
| |
| For in this place of shade and sound, | |
| Hid from the garish heat around, | 35 |
| I feel like one removed from strain | |
| And fever of the happy brain,— | |
| Where thoughts thrill fiery into pain: | |
| Like one who, in the pleasant shade | |
| The peaceful pulseless dead have made, | 40 |
| Walking in silence, just perceives | |
| The gaudy world from which he went | |
| Subdue itself to his content, | |
| Like that white globe beyond the leaves! | |
| |
