VAIN FINDING
Ever before my face there went
Betwixt earth's buds and me
A beauty beyond earth's content,
A hope—half memory:
Till in the woods one evening—
Ah! eyes as dark as they,
Fastened on mine unwontedly,
Grey, and dear heart, how grey!
NAPOLEON
"What is the world, O soldiers?
It is I:
I, this incessant snow,
This northern sky;
Soldiers, this solitude
Through which we go
Is I."
ENGLAND
No lovelier hills than thine have laid
My tired thoughts to rest:
No peace of lovelier valleys made
Like peace within my breast.
Thine are the woods whereto my soul,
Out of the noontide beam,
Flees for a refuge green and cool
And tranquil as a dream.
Thy breaking seas like trumpets peal;
Thy clouds—how oft have I
Watched their bright towers of silence steal
Into infinity!
My heart within me faults to roam
In thought even far from thee:
Thine be the grave whereto I come,
And thine my darkness be.