She glides in silence into the tall bracken,
Then plunges lost beneath the lichened boughs:
Air burns in the vast light, earth’s noises slacken,
And wood and welkin drowse.
The Spring.
A live spring sparkles in the bosky gloom,
Hidden from the noonday glare;
The green reeds bend above its banks and there
Blue-bells and violets bloom.
No kids that batten on the bitter herb,
On slopes of the near hill,
Nor shepherd’s song, nor flute-note sweet and shrill,
Its crystal source disturb.
Hard by, the dark oaks weave a peaceful screen
Whose shade the wild-bee loves,
And nestled in dense leaves the murmuring doves
Their ruffled plumage preen.
The lazy stags in mossy thickets browse
And sniff the lingering dew;
Beneath cool leaves, that let the sunlight through,
The languorous Sylvans drowse.
White Naïs, near the sacred spring that drips,
Closing her lids awhile,
Dreams as she slumbers, and a radiant smile
Floats on her purple lips.
No eye, kindling with love’s desire, has scanned
Beneath those lucent veils
The nymph whose snowy limbs and hair that trails
Gleam on the silvery sand.
None gazed on the soft cheek, suffused with youth,
The splendid bosom’s swerve,
The ivory neck, the shoulder’s delicate curve,
White arms and innocent mouth.
But now the lecherous Faun, that haunts the grove,
Spies from his leafy trench
Those supple flanks, kissed by the oozy drench
As with a kiss of love;