A DAY IN THE PAMFILI DORIA
Though the hills are cold and snowy,
And the wind drives chill to-day,
My heart goes back to a spring-time,
Far, far in the past away.
And I see a quaint old city,
Weary and worn and brown,
Where the spring and the birds are so early,
And the sun in such light goes down.
I remember that old-times villa,
Where our afternoons went by,
Where the suns of March flushed warmly,
And spring was in earth and sky.
Out of the mouldering city,
Mouldering, old, and gray,
We sped, with a lightsome heart-thrill,
For a sunny, gladsome day,—
For a revel of fresh spring verdure,
For a race 'mid springing flowers,
For a vision of plashing fountains,
Of birds and blossoming bowers.
There were violet banks in the shadows,
Violets white and blue;
And a world of bright anemones,
That over the terrace grew,—
Blue and orange and purple,
Rosy and yellow and white,
Rising in rainbow bubbles,
Streaking the lawns with light.
And down from the old stone pine-trees,
Those far-off islands of air,
The birds are flinging the tidings
Of a joyful revel up there.
And now for the grand old fountains,
Tossing their silvery spray,
Those fountains so quaint and so many,
That are leaping and singing all day.