En.Citatepedia^®.ro

On Ettrick Forest's Mountains Dun {Life In The Forest}

On Ettrick Forest's mountains dun
'Tis blithe to hear the sportsman's gun,
And seek the heath-frequenting brood
Far through the noonday solitude;
By many a cairn and trenched mound,
Where chiefs of yore sleep lone and sound,
And springs, where grey-hair'd shepherds tell
That still the fairies love to dwell.

Along the silver streams of Tweed
'Tis blithe the mimic fly to lead,
When to the hook the salmon springs,
And the line whistles through the rings;
The boiling eddy see him try,
Then dashing from the current high,
Till watchful eye and cautious hand
Have led his wasted strength to land.

'Tis blithe along the midnight tide
With stalwart arm the boat to guide;
On high the dazzling blaze to rear,
And heedful plunge the barbed spear:
Rock, wood, and scaur, emerging bright,
Fling on the stream their ruddy light,
And from the bank our band appears
Like Genii, arm'd with fiery spears.

'Tis blithe at eve to tell the tale,
How we succeed, and how we fail,
Whether at Alwyn's lordly meal,
Or lowlier board of Ashestiel;
While the gay tapers cheerly shine,
Bickers the fire, and fhws the wine—
Days free from thought, and nights from care,
My blessing on the Forest fair!

poem by Sir Walter Scott
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A Jacobite's Exile

The weary day runs down and dies,
The weary night wears through:
And never an hour is fair wi' flower,
And never a flower wi' dew.

I would the day were night for me,
I would the night were day:
For then would I stand in my ain fair land,
As now in dreams I may.

O lordly flow the Loire and Seine,
And loud the dark Durance:
But bonnier shine the braes of Tyne
Than a' the fields of France;
And the waves of Till that speak sae still
Gleam goodlier where they glance.

O weel were they that fell fighting
On dark Drumossie's day:
They keep their hame ayont the faem
And we die far away.

O sound they sleep, and saft, and deep,
But night and day wake we;
And ever between the sea banks green
Sounds loud the sundering sea.

And ill we sleep, sae sair we weep
But sweet and fast sleep they:
And the mool that haps them roun' and laps them
Is e'en their country's clay;
But the land we tread that are not dead
Is strange as night by day.

Strange as night in a strange man's sight,
Though fair as dawn it be:
For what is here that a stranger's cheer
Should yet wax blithe to see?

The hills stand steep, the dells lie deep,
The fields are green and gold:
The hill-streams sing, and the hill-sides ring,
As ours at home of old.

But hills and flowers are nane of ours,
And ours are over sea:
And the kind strange land whereon we stand,
It wotsna what were we
Or ever we came, wi' scathe and shame,
To try what end might be.

Scathe and shame, and a waefu' name,
And a weary time and strange,
Have they that seeing a weird for dreeing
Can die, and cannot change.

Shame and scorn may we thole that mourn,
Though sair be they to dree:
But ill may we bide the thoughts we hide,
Mair keen than wind and sea.

Ill may we thole the night's watches,
And ill the weary day:
And the dreams that keep the gates of sleep,
A waefu' gift gie they;
For the songs they sing us, the sights they bring us,
The morn blaws all away.

On Aikenshaw the sun blinks braw,
The burn rins blithe and fain:
There's nought wi' me I wadna gie
To look thereon again.

On Keilder-side the wind blaws wide:
There sounds nae hunting-horn
That rings sae sweet as the winds that beat
Round banks where Tyne is born.

The Wansbeck sings with all her springs
The bents and braes give ear;
But the wood that rings wi' the sang she sings
I may not see nor hear;
For far and far thae blithe burns are,
And strange is a' thing near.

The light there lightens, the day there brightens,
The loud wind there lives free:
Nae light comes nigh me or wind blaws by me
That I wad hear or see.

But O gin I were there again,
Afar ayont the faem,
Cauld and dead in the sweet saft bed
That haps my sires at hame!

We'll see nae mair the sea-banks fair,
And the sweet grey gleaming sky,
And the lordly strand of Northumberland,
And the goodly towers thereby;
And none shall know but the winds that blow
The graves wherein we lie.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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The Shepherd's Wife's Song

Ah, what is love? It is a pretty thing,
As sweet unto a shepherd as a king,
And sweeter, too:
For kings have cares that wait upon a crown,
And cares can make the sweetest love to frown:
Ah then, ah then,
If country loves such sweet desires do gain,
What lady would not love a shepherd swain?

His flocks are folded; he comes home at night
As merry as a king in his delight,
And merrier, too:
For kings bethink them what the state require,
Where shepherds, careless, carol by the fire:

He kisseth first, then sits at blithe to eat
His cream and curds, as doth a king his meat,
And blither, too:
For kings have often fears when they do sup,
Where shepherds dread no poison in their cup:

To bed he goes, as wanton then, I ween,
As is a king in dalliance with a queen;
More wanton, too:
For kings have many griefs, affects to move,
Where shepherds have no greater grief than love:

Upon his couch of straw he sleeps as sound
As doth the king upon his bed of down;
More sounder, too:
For cares cause kings full oft their sleep to spill,
Where weary shepherds lie and snort their fill:

Thus, with his wife, he spends the year as blithe
As doth the king at every tide or sithe,
And blither, too:
For kings have wars and broils to take in hand,
Where shepherds laugh and love upon the land:
Ah then, ah then,
Since country loves such sweet desires do gain,
What lady would not love a shepherd swain?

poem by Robert Greene
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The West-Of-Wessex Girl

A very West-of-Wessex girl,
As blithe as blithe could be,
Was once well-known to me,
And she would laud her native town,
And hope and hope that we
Might sometime study up and down
Its charms in company.

But never I squired my Wessex girl
In jaunts to Hoe or street
When hearts were high in beat,
Nor saw her in the marbled ways
Where market-people meet
That in her bounding early days
Were friendly with her feet.

Yet now my West-of-Wessex girl,
When midnight hammers slow
From Andrew's, blow by blow,
As phantom draws me by the hand
To the place-Plymouth Hoe-
Where side by side in life, as planned,
We never were to go!

Begun in Plymouth, March 1913

poem by Thomas Hardy
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From Our Happy Home

From our happy home
Through the world we roam
One week in all the year,
Making winter spring
With the joy we bring,
For Christmas-tide is here.

Now the eastern star
Shines from afar
To light the poorest home;
Hearts warmer grow,
Gifts freely flow,
For Christmas-tide has come.

Now gay trees rise
Before young eyes,
Abloom with tempting cheer;
Blithe voices sing,
And blithe bells ring,
For Christmas-tide is here.

Oh, happy chime,
Oh, blessed time,
That draws us all so near!
'Welcome, dear day,'
All creatures say,
For Christmas-tide is here.

poem by Louisa May Alcott
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Resurgam

(Autumn Song)

Chill breezes moaning are
Where leaves hang yellow:
O'er the grey hills afar
Flies the last swallow;
To come again, my love, to come again
Blithe with the summer.
But Ah! the long months ere we welcome then
That bright new comer.

Cold lie the flowers and dead
Where leaves are falling.
Meekly they bowed and sped
At Autumn's calling.
To come again, my love, to come again
Blithe with the swallow.
Ah! might I dreaming lie at rest till then,
Or rise and follow!

The summer blooms are gone,
And bright birds darting;
Cold lies the earth forlorn;
And we are parting.
To meet again, my love, to meet again
In deathless greeting,
But ah! what wintry bitterness of pain
Ere that far meeting!

poem by Mary Colborne-Veel
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The Father's Lament

How can you bid this heart be blithe,
When blithe this heart can never be?
I've lost the jewel from my crown -
Look round our circle, and you'll see
That there is ane out o' the ring
Who never can forgotten be -
Ay, there's a blank at my right hand,
That ne'er can be made up to me!

'Tis said, as water wears the rock,
That time wears out the deepest line;
It may be true wi' hearts enow,
But never can apply to mine.
For I have learn'd to know and feel -
Though losses should forgotten be -
That still the blank at my right hand
Can never be made up to me!

I blame not Providence's sway,
For I have many joys beside;
And fain would I in grateful way
Enjoy the same, whate'er betide.
A mortal thing should ne'er repine,
But stoop to supreme decree;
Yet oh! the blank at my right hand
Can never be made up to me.

poem by James Hogg
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From The Short Story A Christmas Dream, And How It Came True

From our happy home
Through the world we roam
One week in all the year,
Making winter spring
With the joy we bring
For Christmas-tide is here.

Now the eastern star
Shines from afar
To light the poorest home;
Hearts warmer grow,
Gifts freely flow,
For Christmas-tide has come.

Now gay trees rise
Before young eyes,
Abloom with tempting cheer;
Blithe voices sing,
And blithe bells ring,
For Christmas-tide is here.

Oh, happy chime,
Oh, blessed time,
That draws us all so near!
"Welcome, dear day,"
All creatures say,
For Christmas-tide is here.

poem by Louisa May Alcott
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Sunrise Along Shore

Athwart the harbor lingers yet
The ashen gleam of breaking day,
And where the guardian cliffs are set
The noiseless shadows steal away;
But all the winnowed eastern sky
Is flushed with many a tender hue,
And spears of light are smiting through
The ranks where huddled sea-mists fly.

Across the ocean, wan and gray,
Gay fleets of golden ripples come,
For at the birth-hour of the day
The roistering, wayward winds are dumb.
The rocks that stretch to meet the tide
Are smitten with a ruddy glow,
And faint reflections come and go
Where fishing boats at anchor ride.

All life leaps out to greet the light --
The shining sea-gulls dive and soar,
The swallows whirl in dizzy flight,
And sandpeeps flit along the shore.
From every purple landward hill
The banners of the morning fly,
But on the headlands, dim and high,
The fishing hamlets slumber still.

One boat alone beyond the bar
Is sailing outward blithe and free,
To carry sturdy hearts afar
Across those wastes of sparkling sea;
Staunchly to seek what may be won
From out the treasures of the deep,
To toil for those at home who sleep
And be the first to greet the sun.

poem by Lucy Maud Montgomery
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Forest Follies

The Green Man
and the gargoyle
sat idly by.

As the forest
caught fire
and the flames
they grew high.

Till mountains of smoke
had covered the sky.

Then down flew the fairies
in fury they came.

And battle they did
with that furious flame.

Sending in torrents
of free falling rain.

Then away
to the mountain
the fairies did fly.

As the souls
of the forest
did softly sigh.

poem by Lynne FincherSpringarden
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`Resurgam

(Autumn Song)

   Chill breezes moaning are
   Where leaves hang yellow:
   O'er the grey hills afar
   Flies the last swallow;
To come again, my love, to come again
   Blithe with the summer.
But Ah! the long months ere we welcome then
   That bright new comer.

   Cold lie the flowers and dead
   Where leaves are falling.
   Meekly they bowed and sped
   At Autumn's calling.
To come again, my love, to come again
   Blithe with the swallow.
Ah! might I dreaming lie at rest till then,
   Or rise and follow!

   The summer blooms are gone,
   And bright birds darting;
   Cold lies the earth forlorn;
   And we are parting.
To meet again, my love, to meet again
   In deathless greeting,
But ah! what wintry bitterness of pain
   Ere that far meeting!

poem by Mary Colborne-Veel
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Fish And Shadow

The salmon-trout drifts in the stream,
The soul of the salmon-trout floats over the stream
Like a little wafer of light.

The salmon moves in the sun-shot, bright shallow sea. . . .

As light as the shadow of the fish
that falls through the water,
She came into the large room by the stair,
Yawning a little she came with the sleep still upon her.

'I am just from bed. The sleep is still in my eyes.
'Come. I have had a long dream.'
And I: That wood?
'And two springs have passed us.'
'Not so far, no, not so far now,
There is a place but no one else knows it
A field in a valley . . .
Qu'ieu sui avinen,
Ieu lo sai,'

She must speak of the time
Of Arnaut de Mareuil, I thought, 'qu'ieu sui avinen.’

Light as the shadow of the fish
That falls through the pale green water.

poem by Ezra Pound
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Sonnet II

Her courts are by the flux of flaming ways,
Between the rivers and the illumined sky
Whose fervid depths reverberate from on high
Fierce lustres mingled in a fiery haze.
They mark it inland; blithe and fair of face
Her suitors follow, guessing by the glare
Beyond the hilltops in the evening air
How bright the cressets at her portals blaze.
On the pure fronts Defeat ere many a day
Falls like the soot and dirt on city-snow;
There hopes deferred lie sunk in piteous seams.
Her paths are disillusion and decay,
With ruins piled and unapparent woe,
The graves of Beauty and the wreck of dreams.

poem by Alan Seeger
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To Dr. John Brown: Sonnets

BEYOND the north wind lay the land of old
Where men dwelt blithe and blameless, clothed and fed
With joy’s bright raiment and with love’s sweet bread,
The whitest flock of earth’s maternal fold.
None there might wear about his brows enrolled
A light of lovelier fame than rings your head,
Whose lovesome love of children and the dead
All men give thanks for: I far off behold
A dear dead hand that links us, and a light
The blithest and benignest of the night,
The night of death’s sweet sleep, wherein may be
A star to show your spirit in present sight
Some happier island in the Elysian sea
Where Rab may lick the hand of Marjorie.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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A Ballade of Home

LET others prate of Greece and Rome,
And towns where they may never be,
The muse should wander nearer home.
My country is enough for me;
Her wooded hills that watch the sea,
Her inland miles of springing corn,
At Macedon or Barrakee—
I love the land where I was born.
On Juliet smile the autumn stars
And windswept plains by Winchelsea,
In summer on their sandy bars
Her rivers loiter languidly.
Where singing waters fall and flee
The gullied ranges dip to Lorne
With musk and gum and myrtle tree—
I love the land where I was born.

The wild things in her tangles move
As blithe as fauns in Sicily,
Where Melbourne rises roof by roof
The tall ships serve her at the quay,
And hers the yoke of liberty
On stalwart shoulders lightly worn,
Where thought and speech and prayer are free—
I love the land where I was born.

Princes and lords of high degree,
Smile, and we fling you scorn for scorn,
In hope and faith and memory
I love the land where I was born.

poem by Enid Derham
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Poulain The Prisoner

I.

BEYOND his silent vault green springs went by,
The river flashed along its open way,
Blithe swallows flitted in their billowy play,
And the sweet lark went quivering up the sky.
With him was stillness and his heart's dumb cry
And darkness of the tomb through hopeless day,
Save that along the wall one single ray
Shifted, through jealous loop-holes, westerly.

One single ray: and where its light could fall
His rusty nail carved saints and angels there,
And warriors, and slim girls with braided hair,
And blossomy boughs, and birds athwart the air.
Rude work, but yet a world. And light for all
Was one slant ray upon a prison wall.

II.

One ray, and in its track hlie lived and wrought,
And in free wideness of the world, I know,
One said, 'Fair sunshine, yet it serves not so,
It needs a tenderer when I shape my thought;'
And, ''Tis too brown and molten in the drought,'
And, ''Tis too wan a greyness in this snow,'
And would have toiled, but wearied and was woe,
While days stole past and had bequeathed him nought.

Maybe in Gisors, round the fortress mead—
Gisors where now, when fair-time brings its press,
They seek the prisoner's tower to gaze and guess
And love the work he made in loneliness—
One cursed the gloom, and died without a deed,
The while he carved where his one ray could lead.

III.

'Oh loneliness! oh darkness!' so we wail,
Crying to life to give we know not what,
The hope not come, the ecstasy forgot,
The things we should have had and, needing, fail,
Nor know what thing it was for which we ail,
And, like tired travellers to an unknown spot,
Pass listless, noting only 'Yet 'tis not,'
And count the ended day an empty tale.

Ah me! to linger on in dim repose
And feel the numbness over hand and thought,
And feel the silence in the heart, that grows.
Ah me! to have forgot the hope we sought.
One ray of light, and a soul lived and wrought,
And on the prison walls a message rose.

poem by Augusta Davies Webster
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A Bird Flying Into Freedom....

At night alone in bed
I hear music in my ears
Flute reverberating around my walls
I fly like a bird
Spreading my wings throughout a blue sky
Days of summer
Brighter days
Newer visions
Freeing myself from the clutches of
our memories
On top of the cliff i land my feet
and see the world
In a more beautiful way
Fresh, invigorating
Pulsating

Love i pray
More strength today
Break my spirit
Blithe!

poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Nora on the Pavement

As Nora on the pavement
Dances, and she entrances the grey hour
Into the laughing circle of her power,
The magic circle of her glances,
As Nora dances on the midnight pavement;

Petulant and bewildered,
Thronging desires and longing looks recur,
And memorably re-incarnate her,
As I remember that old longing,
A footlight fancy, petulant and bewildered;

There where the ballet circles,
See her, but ah! not free her from the race
Of glittering lines that link and interlace;
This colour now, now that, may be her,
In the bright web of those harmonious circles.

But what are these dance-measures,
Leaping and joyous, keeping time alone
With Life's capricious rhythm, and all her own,
Life's rhythm and hers, long sleeping,
That wakes, and knows not why, in these dance-measures?

It is the very Nora;
Child, and most blithe, and wild as any elf,
And innocently spendthrift of herself,
And guileless and most unbeguiled,
Herself at last, leaps free the very Nora.

It is the soul of Nora,
Living at last, and giving forth to the night,
Bird-like, the burden of its own delight,
All its desire, and all the joy of living,
In that blithe madness of the soul of Nora.

poem by Arthur Symons
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On Tweed River

Merrily swim we, the moon shines bright,
Both current and ripple are dancing in light.
We have roused the night raven, I heard him croak
As we plashed along beneath the oak
That flings its broad branches so far and so wide,
Their shadows are dancing in the midst of the tide.
'Who wakens my nestlings,' the raven he said,
'My beak shall ere morn in his blood be red,
For a blue-swollen corpse is a dainty meal,
And I’ll have my share with the pike and the eel.'

II.
Merrily swim we, the moon shines bright,
There's a golden gleam on the distant height;
There's a silver shadow on the alders dank,
And the drooping willows that wave on the bank.
I see the Abbey, both turret and tower,
It is all astir for the vesper hour;
The monks for the chapel are leaving each cell,
But where’s Father Philip, should toll the bell?

III.
Merrily swim we, the moon shines bright,
Downward we drift through shadow and light.
Under yon rock the eddies sleep,
Calm and silent, dark and deep.
The Kelpy has risen from the fathomless pool,
He hath lighted his candle of death and of dool:
Look, Father, look, and you’ll laugh to see
How he gapes and he glares with his eyes on thee!

IV.
Good luck to your fishing, whom watch ye to night?
A man of mean or a man of might?
Is it layman or priest that must float in your cove,
Or lover who crosses to visit his love?
Hark! heard ye the Kelpy reply as we passed,-—
'God's blessing on the warder, he lock'd the bridge fast!
All that come to my cove are sunk,
Priest or layman, lover or monk.'
…
Landed—landed! the black book hath won,
Else had you seen Berwick with morning sun!
Sain ye, and save ye, and blithe mot ye be,
For seldom they land that go swimming with me.

poem by Sir Walter Scott
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A Farewell to Abbotsford

HOME of the gifted! fare thee well,
And a blessing on thee rest;
While the heather waves its purple bell
O'er moor and mountain crest;
While stream to stream around thee calls,
And braes with broom are drest,
Glad be the harping in thy halls-
A blessing on thee rest.

While the high voice from thee sent forth
Bids rock and cairn reply,
Wakening the spirits of the North,
Like a chieftan's gathering cry;
While its deep master-tones hold sway
As a king's o'er every breast,
Home of the Legend and the Lay!
A blessing on thee rest!

Joy to thy hearth, and board, and bower!
Long honours to thy line!
And hearts of proof, and hands of power,
And bright names worthy thine!
By the merry step of childhood, still
May thy free sward be prest!
-While one proud pulse in the land can thrill,
A blessing on thee rest!

poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Folklore in Maytime

Fairies elves and pixies
heed our little song;
o'er hill and dale
we search for you
through the grasses long,
looking for blithe spirits
fairy kings and queens
in a land of make believe
wishing wells and streams...
recapturing pretty roses
around the fairy ring.
'Folklore in Maytime'
this is the song we sing.

poem by Joyce Hemsley
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