Full-foaming milk-pails, Alpine fare,
Sweet heaps of fresh-cut grass,
Invite to rest the traveller there
Before he climb the pass,—
The gentian-flowered pass, its crown[29]
With yellow spires aflame;
Whence drops the path to Allière down,
And walls where Byron came;[30]
By their green river, who doth change
His birth-name just below,
Orchard and croft and full-stored grange
Nursed by his pastoral flow.
But stop! to fetch back thoughts that stray
Beyond this gracious bound,
The cone of Jaman, pale and gray,
See, in the blue profound!
Ah, Jaman! delicately tall
Above his sun-warmed firs,—
What thoughts to me his rocks recall,
What memories he stirs!
And who but thou must be, in truth,
Obermann! with me here?
Thou master of my wandering youth,
But left this many a year!
Yes, I forget the world’s work wrought,
Its warfare waged with pain:
An eremite with thee, in thought
Once more I slip my chain,—
And to thy mountain chalet come,
And lie beside its door,
And hear the wild bee’s Alpine hum,
And thy sad, tranquil lore.
Again I feel the words inspire
Their mournful calm; serene,
Yet tinged with infinite desire
For all that might have been,—
The harmony from which man swerved
Made his life’s rule once more;
The universal order served,
Earth happier than before.