Not a pastoral song has a pleasanter tune Than ye speak to my heart, little wildings of June: Where I thought it delightful your beauties to find, Even now what affections the violet awakes; What landscapes I read in the primrose's looks, Earth's cultureless buds, to my heart ye were dear, Had scathed my existence's bloom; Once I welcome you more, in life's passionless stage, And I wish you to grow on my tomb. THE DAISY. WITH little here to do or see Of things that in the great world be, For thou art worthy. Thou unassuming commonplace T. Campbell. Oft on the dappled turf at ease I sit and play with similes, Loose types of things through all degrees, And many a fond and idle name A nun demure of lowly port; Of all temptations; A queen in crown of rubies drest; A starveling in a scanty vest; A little cyclops, with one eye The shape will vanish-and behold I see thee glittering from afar-- In heaven above thee! Yet like a star, with glittering crest, Self-poised in air thou seem'st to rest; May peace come never to his nest, Who shall reprove thee! Bright Flower! for by that name at last, I call thee, and to that cleave fast, That breath'st with me in sun and air, Of thy meek nature! THE DANDELION. W. Wordsworth. EAR common flower, that grow'st beside the way, First pledge of blithesome May, Which children pluck, and full of pride, uphold, Which not the rich earth's ample round Gold such as thine ne'er drew the Spanish prow Nor wrinkled the lean brow Of age, to rob the lover's heart of ease; 'Tis the Spring's largess, which she scatters now To rich and poor alike, with lavish hand; Thou art my tropics and mine Italy; The eyes thou givest me Are in the heart, and heed not space or time: His conquered Sybaris, than I, when first Then think I of deep shadows on the grass,— Where, as the breezes pass The gleaming rushes lean a thousand ways,— That from the distance sparkle through Some woodland gap,-and of a sky above, Where one white cloud like a stray lamb doth move. My childhood's earliest thoughts are linked with thee; The sight of thee calls back the robin's song, Who, from the dark old tree Beside the door, sang clearly all day long, Listened as if I heard an angel sing With news from heaven, which he did bring Fresh every day to my untainted ears When birds and flowers and I were happy peers. How like a prodigal doth nature seem, When thou, for all thy gold, so common art! More sacredly of every human heart, Since each reflects in joy its scanty gleam Of heaven, and could some wondrous secret show, THE SWEETBRIAR. WILD rose, sweetbriar, eglantine, As the rose in gardens dress'd I'm the lass in simple vest, The country lass whose blood's the best. In the morn with golden fire Scented, too, they'd smell like me, All Elysian pungency. THE GARDEN. DEAR garden! once again with lingering look J. R. Lowell. Leigh Hunt. |