THE WOODLAND WALK.
Through the murk of the night, thou rememberest well, The year and the month and the day of the week, When we slipped away from that great hotel, To escape the Babel of tongues that fell, With wearisome sameness of sound and swell, On ears that had wiser employ to seek. The night was as calm as a child’s first prayer, And we did not venture one word to speak Till we entered the path of the cool green wood, And felt in our whispering hearts it was good, For thee and me to be there.
Thy hand on my arm, we held our way Till we came to the mountain lake, The dear little woodland lake, Where together we sat on its margin gray, And queried on all they meant to say, The batrachian people that round it spake;— And the peace of the skies, with stars o’erstrown, Passed into our souls, my life! my own! And I loved the universe more for thy sake.
Gladly we watched the full-orbéd moon Rising behind the shimmering trees, Till she kissed their slumbering brows, when soon In a silvery sea they sank in swoon. When over them ran a tremulous breeze,— While they dreamt of joy and murmured their love To the Lady who laughed at their worship above,— Making a mimic noon.
Down over the rim of the forest she looked, So chaste her beauty, all evil things, With or without or feet or wings, In the might of her purity felt rebuked.— She looked in her mirror, the lake, to behold Her image once more:— “It was lovely of yore, And cannot grow charmless, cannot grow old, No wrinkle the malice of years hath wrought On that envied brow, which is fair to-night As when the first pair of true lovers sought My friendly smiles to aid their flight, And hallow the vows their twin-hearts taught.”
This to her image the chaste moon said;— And such, my beloved, is thy face to me, (Nay, do not shake that skeptical head,) Ever as fair, ever as young, As when first thy beauty inspired my tongue To pray the Fates that our names might be Together engraved, and the tablet hung On the love-lit walls of eternity.
Athwart the white tablet if shadows are cast, As clouds the face of the moon perplex, It is wiser to think they will not last, However prolonged, and cold, and vast, Shadow and cloud will cease to vex.
These we will strive to forget, but not Our woodland walk on that July night, When the craze of the world was quite forgot, And heaven came down to the arbored spot, Where we bathed in Dian’s crystal light.
The happy musicians around the lake, Who kept all the infant echoes awake, The bull-frogs bellow, the tree-toads trill, The plaintive cry of the whip-poor-will, And the hawk’s alarm—I hear them still.
One hour of rest in the forest shade, Where delicate mosses on rocks are laid, And violets peep from under a stone, Is a blissful exchange for the city’s parade, Its prodigal shows and masquerade, Where mammon is king, and rest there is none.
Better than all the philosophy taught By sages famed in the realm of thought;— Truer than sermons, wiser than books, And honester far than the solemnest looks Of parson or priest, was the ancient lore That back from the woods in our hearts we bore, The woods, and the lake and the lisping brooks, To a world that is weary, yet rests nevermore.