The naked trees, that stand with buried feet,
Like skeletons, will slender shadows throw
On what seems spread as nature’s winding-sheet,
While her slain beauties lie concealed below.
Then, but to look abroad on vale and hill,
Where one pale uniform invests the whole,
Though it should make one’s vital current chill,
It must not let in winter to the soul!
It must not bring a frost upon the heart,
To kill affection’s tendrils—friendship’s root,
Where vernal shoots and buds should ever start,
And grow with summer flowers and autumn fruit:
Nor cause the streams of thought to be congealed,
Or, pressed beneath incumbent ice, grow low;
But, like the fount that irrigates the field,
Make bloom and verdure spring, where’er they flow.
It must not make our shrinking fancies flee,
Like birds of summer from the cold withdrawn;
But wise, the mind should, like the prudent bee,
On honey banquet, though the flowers are gone.
Nor must it strike the hopeful spirit dumb,
Or quench the beaming of her upturned eye,
Or close her ear, or make her members numb,
Ere her thank-offerings on the altar lie.
And yet, fair Moon, methinks I like the best
To see thy silvery lustre sprinkled here,
When these bare branches all appear full-dressed,
In some more gentle season of the year.
I love to see it, mingled with the dew,
Falling to bathe the sleeping buds and flowers;
And soft, and silent, coolly streaming through
The whispering leaves, that clothe the summer bowers.
I love to see thy beaming mantle trail
Along the flower-sprent borders of the rill,
With rich, deep shadows stamped, o’erspread the vale,
Or bind the forehead of the silent hill.
I love to see thee through the foliage peep,
Where, one soft hour before, the robin sung
Her vesper song; the while, in downy sleep,
With peaceful breast she guards her callow young.