Classic Poem

Keep ever on your eagle flight,
You spirits swift and strong;
This quiet vale is my delight,
Nor more requires my song.

You circle in the dizzy height,
And gaze in haughty mood;
A cleft—the vale is in your sight,
A timber heap—the wood.

The beauteous trees, the silver stream,
That winds with reach and creek,
Through meadows in the ample gleam,
Is mapp'd to you—a streak.

The little bird who sits and sings,
Right to man's deepest joys,
Before into the clouds he springs,
Is but a tuneless noise.

What matters it that you neighbours be
To morn and even-glow?
Around doth silence, as a sea,
Make life like death to show.

So will I praise my quiet vale,
With all that peace provides;
Where lovingly and warmly, all
Bows to me, and confides.

There have I in a little space,
All that a man can have;
The world looks friendly in my face,
And that which looks doth live.