Classic Poem

IX.—TO A DISTANT SCENE

Still are the cowslips from thy bosom springing,
O far-off glassy dell?—and dost thou see,
When southern winds first wake the vernal singing,
The star-gleam of the wood anemone?
Doth the shy ring-dove haunt thee yet—the bee
Hang on thy flowers as when I breathed farewell
To their wild blooms? and round my beechen tree
Still, in green softness, doth the moss bank swell?
—Oh! strange illusion by the fond heart wrought,
Whose own warm life suffuses nature's face!
—My being's tide of many-color'd thought
Hath pass'd from thee, and now, rich, leafy place!
I paint thee oft, scarce consciously, a scene,
Silent, forsaken, dim, shadow'd by what hath been.