Avenue In Savernake Forest
How soothing sound the gentle airs that move
The innumerable leaves, high overhead,
When autumn first, from the long avenue,
That lifts its arching height of ancient shade,
Steals here and there a leaf!
Within the gloom,
In partial sunshine white, some trunks appear,
Studding the glens of fern; in solemn shade
Some mingle their dark branches, but yet all,
All make a sad sweet music, as they move,
Not undelightful to a stranger's heart.
They seem to say, in accents audible,
Farewell to summer, and farewell the strains
Of many a lithe and feathered chorister,
That through the depth of these incumbent woods
Made the long summer gladsome.
I have heard
To the deep-mingling sounds of organs clear,
(When slow the choral anthem rose beneath),
The glimmering minster, through its pillared aisles,
Echo;--but not more sweet the vaulted roof
Rang to those linked harmonies, than here
The high wood answers to the lightest breath
Of nature.
Oh, may such sweet music steal,
Soothing the cares of venerable age,
From public toil retired: may it awake,
As, still and slow, the sun of life declines,
Remembrances, not mournful, but most sweet;
May it, as oft beneath the sylvan shade
Their honoured owner strays, come like the sound
Of distant seraph harps, yet speaking clear!
How poor is every sound of earthly things,
When heaven's own music waits the just and pure!
poem by William Lisle Bowles

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In The Shade Of The Green Wood
In the shade of the green wood
The holly does grow,
While in soft rays of sunlight
The wild roses glow,
And I smell their sweet perfume
That gently floats by,
Past trees strong and mighty
That reach to the sky,
The pathway of gold autumn
Leaves still remain,
As I walk through the green wood again.
In the shade of the green wood
This bright sunny morn,
That's so cool in the shadows
A new day is born,
All the birds in the treetops
Are singing for me,
Sweet songs of the summer
Which fill me with glee,
And know from its beauty
I never shall part,
For the green wood does live in my heart.
In the shade of the green wood
A soft gentle breeze,
Now caresses the branches
And whispers through trees,
A sound reassuring
Shall carry me to,
All the scenes that exist
In each marvellous view,
It's here that my spirit
Shall always now stay,
And the green wood is guiding my way.
poem by Andrew Blakemore

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Our Canadian Woods In Early Autumn
I have passed the day ’mid the forest gay,
In its gorgeous autumn dyes,
Its tints as bright and as fair to the sight
As the hues of our sunset skies;
And the sun’s glad rays veiled by golden haze,
Streamed down ’neath its arches grand,
And with magic power made scene and hour
Like a dream of Faerie Land.
The emerald sheen of the maple green
Is turned to deep, rich red;
And the boughs entwine with the crimson vine
That is climbing overhead;
While, like golden sheaves, the saffron leaves
Of the sycamore strew the ground,
’Neath birches old, clad in shimmering gold,
Or the ash with red berries crowned.
Stately and tall, o’er its sisters all,
Stands the poplar, proud and lone,
Every silvery leaf in restless grief
Laments for the summer flown;
While each oak and elm of the sylvan realm,
In brilliant garb arrayed,
With each other vie, ’neath the autumn sky,
In beauty of form and shade
When wearied the gaze with the vivid blaze
Of rich tints before it spread—
Gay orange and gold, with shades untold
Of glowing carmine and red—
It can turn ’mid the scene to the sombre green
Of the fir, the hemlock, the pine,
Ever-keeping their hue, and their freshness, too,
’Mid the season’s swift decline.
Though the bird’s sweet song, that the summer long
Hath flowed so sweet and clear
Through the cool, dim shades of our forest glades,
No longer charms the ear,
A witching spell, that will please as well
As his glad notes, may be found
In the solemn hush, or the leaves’ soft rush,
As they thickly strew the ground.
For, though they tell of summer’s farewell,
Of their own decay and doom,
Of the wild storm-cloud and the snow’s cold shroud,
And the days of winter’s gloom,
The heart must yield to the power they wield,—
Alike tender, soothing, gay—
The beauties that gleam and that reign supreme
In our woods, this autumn day.
poem by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

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Lines Written at Thorp Green
That summer sun, whose genial glow
Now cheers my drooping spirit so
Must cold and distant be,
And only light our northern clime
With feeble ray, before the time
I long so much to see.
And this soft whispering breeze that now
So gently cools my fevered brow,
This too, alas, must turn --
To a wild blast whose icy dart
Pierces and chills me to the heart,
Before I cease to mourn.
And these bright flowers I love so well,
Verbena, rose and sweet bluebell,
Must droop and die away.
Those thick green leaves with all their shade
And rustling music, they must fade
And every one decay.
But if the sunny summer time
And woods and meadows in their prime
Are sweet to them that roam --
Far sweeter is the winter bare
With long dark nights and landscapes drear
To them that are at Home!
poem by Anne Brontë

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Music
Music is an art
Music is presided over by the Muses
Music combines sounds in a pleasing way
Music has common elements.
Music has pitch and melody
Music has harmony and rhythm
Music has tempo and meter
Music has sonic qualities of timbre.
Music is euphony or sweet sound
Music has harmonious qualities
Music is inspirational
Music opens the soul.
Music is energizing
Music is enriching
Music makes one happy
Music is relaxing.
Music is soothing
Music is entertainment
Music is lovable
Music is stirring.
Music moves one to tears
Music gives a spark
Music tunes a special memory
Music is a form of therapy.
Music fills with spiritual attunement
Music is a personal experience
Music takes us along the road of life
Music is the corner stone of every society.
poem by Chandra Thiagarajan

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Sweet Summer Lovin
Though the sun may be dawning
Youre the one that lights the morning
As I awake to the heaven
Of your sweet summer lovin
By a stream in the country
Running barefoot and feeling free
While the love in our hearts blend
Into sweet summer lovin
Sweet summer lovin in the dandelions
Sweet summer lovin keeps me high as candy wine
When that big red balloon sets
Like a painting across the west
As the sky turns a crimson blue
As the world turns for me and you
By the light of the moon glowing
While the warm summer wind blows
cross the sill of your window
Well be letting our love flow
Sweet summer lovin in the dandelions
Sweet summer lovin keeps me high as candy wine
Sweet summer lovin in the dandelions
Sweet summer lovin keeps me high as candy wine
Sweet summer lovin
Sweet summer lovin
Mmm...
Sweet summer lovin
Mmm...
Sweet summer lovin
I love your sweet summer lovin
Sweet summer lovin
Sweet summer lovin
Mmm...
Sweet summer lovin
Mmm...
Sweet summer lovin
song performed by by Dolly Parton

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Forsaken
I.
IT is the music of her native land,--
The airs she used to love in happier days;
The lute is struck by some young gentle hand,
To soothe her spirit with remember'd lays.
II.
But her sad heart is wandering from the notes,
Her ear is fill'd with an imagined strain;
Vainly the soften'd music round her floats,
The echo it awakes is all of pain!
III.
The echo it awakes, is of a voice
Which never more her weary heart shall cheer;
Fain would she banish it, but hath no choice,
Its vanish'd sound still haunts her shrinking ear,--
IV.
Still haunts her with its tones of joy and love,
Its memories of bitterness and wrong,
Bidding her thoughts thro' various changes rove,--
Welcomes, farewells, and snatches of wild song.
V.
Why bring her music? She had half forgot
How left, how lonely, how oppress'd she was;
Why, by these strains, recal her former lot,
The depth of all her suffering, and its cause?
VI.
Know ye not what a spell there is in sound?
Know ye not that the melody of words
Is nothing to the power that wanders round,
Giving vague language to harmonious chords?
VII.
Oh I keep ye silence! He hath sung to her,
And from that hour--(faint twilight, sweet and dim,
When the low breeze scarce made the branches stirs)--
Music hath been a memory of HIM!
VIII.
Chords which the wandering fingers scarcely touch
When they would seek for some forgotten song,--
Stray notes which have no certain meaning, such
As careless hands unthinkingly prolong,--
IX.
Come unto HER, fraught with a vivid dream
Of love, in all its wild and passionate strength,--
Of sunsets, glittering on the purple stream,--
Of shadows, deepening into twilight length,--
X.
Of gentle sounds, when the warm world lay hush'd
Beneath the soft breath of the evening air,--
Of hopes and fears, and expectations crush'd,
By one long certainty of blank despair!
XI.
Bear to the sick man's couch the fiery cup,
Pledged by wild feasters in their riotous hours,
And bid his parch'd lips drink the poison up,
As tho' its foam held cool refreshing powers,--
XII.
Lift some poor wounded wretch, whose writhing pain
Finds soothing only in an utter rest,
Forth in some rude-made litter, to regain
Strength for his limbs and vigour for his breast;--
XIII.
But soothe ye not that proud forsaken heart
With strains whose sweetness maddens as they fall;
Untroubled let her feverish soul depart--
Not long shall memory's power its might enthral;
XIV.
Not long,--tho' balmy be the summer's breath!
In the deep stillness of its golden light,
A shadowy spirit sits, whose name is DEATH,
And turns, what was all beauty, into blight;
XV.
And she, before whose sad and dreaming eye
Visions of by-gone days are sweeping on,
In her unfaded youth shall drooping die,
Shut from the glow of that Italian sun:
XVI.
Then let the organ's solemn notes prolong
Their glory round the silence of her grave,
Then let the choral voices swell in song
And echo thro' the chancel and the nave;
XVII.
For then her heart shall ache not at the sound,
Then the faint fever of her life shall cease
Silence, unbroken, calm, shall reign around,
And the long restless shall be laid at peace.
poem by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton

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Oh Sweet Music
Oh sweet music, music so sweet
keep on sounding so you defeat
the ongoing cacaphony of noises we hear,
the raucousness that infects the ear.
This glory of sound surely must be
what is needed by mind and body.
For without the airs played by man
the world will return to how it began.
Soundless, still and deafened in space.
Oh were it not for the human race,
the music of the soul which reigneth supreme
would only be heard in mankind's dream.
The thought of that affects my heart.
For music to me is the very best part
of living in this world that's all mixed-up.
Oh sweet music please fill my cup.
poem by Edwina Reizer

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Fairy Sketch
SCENE--NETLEY ABBEY.
There was a morrice on the moonlight plain,
And music echoed in the woody glade,
For fay-like forms, as of Titania's train,
Upon a summer eve, beneath the shade
Of Netley's ivied ruins, to the sound
Of sprightly minstrelsy did beat the ground:--
Come, take hands! and lightly move,
While our boat, in yonder cove,
Rests upon the darkening sea;
Come, take hands, and follow me!
Netley! thy dim and desolated fane
Hath heard, perhaps, the spirits of the night
Shrieking, at times, amid the wind and rain;
Or haply, when the full-orbed moon shone bright,
Thy glimmering aisles have echoed to the song
Of fairy Mab, who led her shadowy masque along.
Now, as to the sprightly sound
Of moonlight minstrelsy we beat the ground;
From the pale nooks, in accent clear,
Now, methinks, her voice I hear,
Sounding o'er the darksome sea;
Come, take hands, and follow me!
Here, beneath the solemn wood,
When faintly-blue is all the sky,
And the moon is still on high,
To the murmurs of the flood,
To the glimpses of the night,
We perform our airy rite;--
Care and pain to us unknown,
To the darkening seas are flown.
Hear no more life's fretful noise,
Heed not here pale Envy's sting,
Far from life's distempered joys;
To the waters murmuring,
To the shadows of the sky,
To the moon that rides on high,
To the glimpses of the night,
We perform our airy rite,
While care and pain, to us unknown,
To the darkening seas are flown.
poem by William Lisle Bowles

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It is the hour
It is the hour when from the boughs
The nightingale's high note is heard—
It is the hour—when lovers' vows
Seem sweet in every whisper'd word—
And gentle winds and waters near
Make music to the lonely ear.
Each flower the dews have lightly wet,
And in the sky the stars are met:
And on the wave is deeper blue,
And on the leaf a browner hue—
And in the Heaven, that clear obscure
So softly dark—and darkly pure,
That follows the decline of day
As twilight melts beneath the moon away.
poem by Byron from The Hebrew Melodies (1815)

Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Farewell Sweet, Sweet Summer
Falling leaves off barren trees
Whispering wind a haunting end
To sweet, sweet summer
Kisses goodbye time to cry
Hopeful heart brand new start
After sweet, sweet summer
Grasping for that something more
Smile makes as winter breaks
Farewell sweet, sweet summer
poem by Kamryn Chew

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I Can Hear Music
Ahhhhhh oooooo
This is the way
I always dreamed it would be
The way that it is, oh oh
When you are holding me
I never had a love of my own
Maybe thats why when were all alone
I can hear music
I can hear music
The sound of the city baby seems to disappear
I can hear music
Sweet sweet music
Whenever you touch me baby
Whenever youre near
Lovin you
It keeps me satisfied
And I cant explain, oh no
The way Im feeling inside
You look at me we kiss and then
I close my eyes and here it comes again
I can hear music
I can hear music
The sound of the city baby seems to disappear
I can hear music
Sweet sweet music
Whenever you touch me baby
Whenever youre near
I hear the music all the time, yeah
I hear the music, hold me tight now baby
I hear the music all the time
I hear the music
I hear the music (baby)
Ahhhhh
I can hear music
I can hear music
The sound of the city baby seems to disappear
I can hear music
Sweet sweet music
Whenever you touch me baby
Whenever youre near
song performed by by Beach Boys

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Song For St. Cecilia's Day, At Oxford
I.
Cecilia, whose exalted hymns
With joy and wonder fill the blest,
In choirs of warbling seraphims
Known and distinguish'd fom the rest;
Attend, harmonious saint, and see
Thy vocal sons of harmony;
Attend, harmonious saint, and hear our prayers;
Enliven all our earthly airs,
and, as thou sing'st thy God, teach us to sing of thee:
Tune every string and every tongue,
Be thou the Muse and subject of our song.
II.
Let all Cecilia's praise proclaim,
Enploy the echo in her name.
Hark how the flutes and trumpets raise,
At bright Cecilia's name, their lays;
The organ labours in her praise.
Cecilia's name does all our numbers grace,
From every voice the tuneful accents fly,
In soaring trebles now it rises high,
And now it sinks, and dwells upon the base.
Cecilia's name through all the notes we sing,
The work of every skilful tongue
The sound of every trembling string,
The sound and triumph of our song.
III.
For ever consecrate the day,
To music and Cecilia;
Music, the greatest good that mortals know,
And all of heaven we have below.
Music can noble hints impart,
Engender fury, kindle love;
With unsuspected eloquence can move,
And manage all the man with secret art.
When Orpheus strikes the trembling lyre
The streams stand still, the stones admire;
The listening savages advance,
The world and lamb around him trip
The bears in aukward measures leap,
And tigers mingle in the dance
The moving woods attended as he played
And Rhodope was left without a shade.
IV.
Music religious heats inspires,
It wakes the soul, and lifts it high,
And wings it with sublime desires,
And fits it to bespeak the Deity.
Th' Almighty listens to a tuneful tongue,
And seems well-pleas'd and courted with a song.
Soft moving sounds and heavenly airs
Give forece to every word, and recommend our prayers
When time itself shall be no more,
And all things in confusion hurl'd,
Music shall then exert its power,
And sound survive the ruins of the world:
Then saints and angels shall agree
In one eternal jubilee:
All heaven shall echo with their hymns divine,
And God himself with pleasure see
The whole creation in a chorus join.
C H O R U S.
Consecrate the place and day,
To music and Cecilia Let no rough winds approach, nor dare
Invade the hallow'd bounds,
Nor rudely shake the tuneful air,
Nor spoil the fleeting sounds.
Nor mournful sigh nor groan be heard,
But gladness dwell on every tongue;
Whilst all, with voice and strings prepar'd,
Keep u; the loud harmonious song.
And imitate the blest above,
In joy, and harmony, and love.
poem by Joseph Addison

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Flight To Nature
SICK of the crowd, the toil, the strife,
Sweet Nature, how I turn to thee,
Seeking for renovated life,
By brawling brook and shady tree!
I knew thy rocks had spells of old,
To soothe the wanderer's woe to calm,
And in thy waters, clear and cold,
My fev'rish brow would seek for balm.
I've bent beneath thy ancient oak,
And sought for slumber in its shade,
And, as the clouds above me broke,
I dream'd to find the boon I pray'd;
For light--a blessed light--was given,
Wide streaming round me from above,
And in the deep, deep vaults of heaven,
There shone, methought, a look of love.
And, through the long, long summer hours,
When every bird had won its wing,
How sweet to think, amidst thy flowers,
That youth might yet renew its spring;--
That sacred season of the heart,
When every pulse with hope is strong,
And, still untaught by selfish art,
Truth fears no guile, and love no wrong.
And who, but nature's self, could yield
The blessing in the prayer I made,
Throned in her realm of wood and field,
Of rocky realm and haunted shade?
Who, but that magic queen, whose sway
Drives winter from his path of strife,
Whilst all her thousand fingers play,
With bud and bird, in games of life!
With these a kindred life I ask,--
Not wealth that mortals vainly seek;
But, in heaven's sunshine let me bask,
My heart as glowing as my cheek;--
An idle heart, that would not heed
That chiding voice, when duty comes,
To drag the soul, but freshly freed,
Back to cold toils and weary glooms.
No lure she finds in mortal schemes,
Which wiser fancies still reprove,--
Far happier in her woodland dreams,
With one sweet teacher, taught by love!
Thou, Nature, that magician be,
Restore each dream that taught the boy,
That warm'd his hope, that made him free,
While wisdom took the shape of joy;
And I will bless thee with a song,
As fond as hers, that idle bird,
That sings above me all day long,
As if she knew I watch'd and heard.
poem by William Gilmore Simms

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The Night Dance
Strike the gay harp! see the moon is on high,
And, as true to her beam as the tides of the ocean,
Young hearts, when they feel the soft light of her eye,
Obey the mute call, and heave into motion.
Then, sound notes -- the gayest, the lightest,
That ever took wing, when heaven look'd brightest
Again! Again!
Oh! could such heart-stirring music be heard
In that City of Statues described by romancers,
So wakening its spell, even stone would be stirr'd,
And statues themselves all start into dancers!
Why then delay, with such sounds in our ears,
And the flower of Beauty's own garden before us --
While stars overhead leave the song of their spheres,
And, listening to ours, hang wondering o'er us?
Again, that strain! -- to hear it thus sounding
Might set even Death's cold pulses bounding --
Again! Again!
Oh, what delight when the youthful and gay
Each with eye like a sunbeam and foot like a feather,
Thus dance, like the Hours to the music of May,
And mingle sweet song and sunshine together.
poem by Thomas Moore

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Let It All Be Music
Music is a mirror
Near around my soul
Music is the spirit
Come on let it roll
Music is my nature
People have you heard
Music is my future
Music is the world
Let it all be music
People sing a song
Let it all be music
Let us sing it on and on and on and on
Lets play the music
My kind of music
Lets play the music
Play it on
Lets play the music
My kind of music
Lets play the music
Play it on and on and on
Music isnt somewhere
Music turns you right
Music is a fever
Leads you day and night
Music is like heaven
Where you wanna be
Music is religion
Music sets you free
Let it all be music
People sing a song
Let it all be music
Let us sing it on and on and on and on
Lets play the music
My kind of music
Lets play the music
Play it on
Lets play the music
My kind of music
Lets play the music
Play it on and on and on
Music is tomorrow
Music is today
Music is forever
Music is the way
Music is for women
Music is for men
Music is for children
Sing it all again
Let it all be music
People sing a song
Let it all be music
Let us sing it on and on and on and on
Lets play the music
My kind of music
Lets play the music
Play it on
Lets play the music
My kind of music
Lets play the music
Play it on and on and on
I can feel it, in my soul
I can feel it, in my heart
Sweet sweet sweet music
Music
Sweet sweet sweet music
Sweet music
Play it on
Play it on
My my my my my kind of music
Play it
Play the music
My my my my my kind of music
Play it
I said play it
On and on and on and on
Music
song performed by by Boney M.

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Cadland, Southampton River
If ever sea-maid, from her coral cave,
Beneath the hum of the great surge, has loved
To pass delighted from her green abode,
And, seated on a summer bank, to sing
No earthly music; in a spot like this,
The bard might feign he heard her, as she dried
Her golden hair, yet dripping from the main,
In the slant sunbeam.
So the pensive bard
Might image, warmed by this enchanting scene,
The ideal form; but though such things are not,
He who has ever felt a thought refined;
He who has wandered on the sea of life,
Forming delightful visions of a home
Of beauty and repose; he who has loved,
With filial warmth his country, will not pass
Without a look of more than tenderness
On all the scene; from where the pensile birch
Bends on the bank, amid the clustered group
Of the dark hollies; to the woody shore
That steals diminished, to the distant spires
Of Hampton, crowning the long lucid wave.
White in the sun, beneath the forest-shade,
Full shines the frequent sail, like Vanity,
As she goes onward in her glittering trim,
Amid the glances of life's transient morn,
Calling on all to view her!
Vectis there,
That slopes its greensward to the lambent wave,
And shows through softest haze its woods and domes,
With gray St Catherine's creeping to the sky,
Seems like a modest maid, who charms the more
Concealing half her beauties.
To the East,
Proud, yet complacent, on its subject realm,
With masts innumerable thronged, and hulls
Seen indistinct, but formidable, mark
Albion's vast fleet, that, like the impatient storm,
Waits but the word to thunder and flash death
On him who dares approach to violate
The shores and living scenes that smile secure
Beneath its dragon-watch!
Long may they smile!
And long, majestic Albion (while the sound
From East to West, from Albis to the Po,
Of dark contention hurtles), may'st thou rest,
As calm and beautiful this sylvan scene
Looks on the refluent wave that steals below.
poem by William Lisle Bowles

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When.
Music when sound becomes hollow.
When sun turns to storm.
When earth begins to quake.
Screams echo in Summer breeze.
Laughter floats away on the waves.
Music when silence becomes deafening.
Music when dry eyes start to cry.
Music when dreams turn to nightmares.
Music when calamity turns to chaos.
When clear minds cloud.
When loving heart break.
When children never exist.
When words are never spoken.
Music when sound becomes hollow.
Music when soft voices die.
poem by Jessica Wetzel

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Your Name
The most beautiful sound I've ever heard
is the sound that's contained in just one word,
Your name.
Your name I have said since we were young.
The feel of it as it rolls off my tongue
leaves me to wonder how it can be
that just your name is heaven to me.
It's short and it's sweet and when it's said
images of you are all in my head.
How you look in the morning light,
how you feel in the dark of night,
how you move from day to day,
how you know just what to say.
All of these things do remain.
They're part of all that keeps me sane.
Your name, Your name.
If all other sounds were taken away
and your name was the only sound to stay,
the glories of heaven would shine on my ears
as I heard your name
for the rest of my years.
poem by Edwina Reizer

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The Lover’s Colloquy
[HERNANI, Act V.]
One little moment to indulge the sight
With the rich beauty of the summer's night.
The harp is hushed, and, see, the torch is dim,--
Night and ourselves together. To the brim
The cup of our felicity is filled.
Each sound is mute, each harsh sensation stilled.
Dost thou not think that, e'en while nature sleeps,
Some power its amorous vigils o'er us keeps?
No cloud in heaven; while all around repose,
Come taste with me the fragrance of the rose,
Which loads the night-air with its musky breath,
While everything is still as nature's death.
E'en as you spoke--and gentle words were those
Spoken by you,--the silver moon uprose;
How that mysterious union of her ray,
With your impassioned accents, made its way
Straight to my heart! I could have wished to die
In that pale moonlight, and while thou wert by.
HERNANI. Thy words are music, and thy strain of love
Is borrowed from the choir of heaven above.
DONNA SOL. Night is too silent, darkness too profound
Oh, for a star to shine, a voice to sound--
To raise some sudden note of music now
Suited to night.
HERN. Capricious girl! your vow
Was poured for silence, and to be released
From the thronged tumult of the marriage feast.
DONNA SOL. Yes; but one bird to carol in the field,--
A nightingale, in mossy shade concealed,--
A distant flute,--for music's stream can roll
To soothe the heart, and harmonize the soul,--
O! 'twould be bliss to listen.
[_Distant sound of a horn, the signal that_ HERNANI
_must go to_ DON RUY, _who, having saved his
life, had him bound in a vow to yield it up._]
poem by Victor Hugo

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Cadenabbia. Lake Of Como. (Birds Of Passage. Flight The Fourth)
No sound of wheels or hoof-beat breaks
The silence of the summer day,
As by the loveliest of all lakes
I while the idle hours away.
I pace the leafy colonnade,
Where level branches of the plane
Above me weave a roof of shade
Impervious to the sun and rain.
At times a sudden rush of air
Flutters the lazy leaves o'erhead,
And gleams of sunshine toss and flare
Like torches down the path I tread.
By Somariva's garden gate
I make the marble stairs my seat,
And hear the water, as I wait,
Lapping the steps beneath my feet.
The undulation sinks and swells
Along the stony parapets,
And far away the floating bells
Tinkle upon the fisher's nets.
Silent and slow, by tower and town
The freighted barges come and go,
Their pendent shadows gliding down
By town and tower submerged below.
The hills sweep upward from the shore,
With villas scattered one by one
Upon their wooded spurs, and lower
Bellaggio blazing in the sun.
And dimly seen, a tangled mass
Of walls and woods, of light and shade,
Stands, beckoning up the Stelvio Pass,
Varenna with its white cascade.
I ask myself, Is this a dream?
Will it all vanish into air?
Is there a land of such supreme
And perfect beauty anywhere?
Sweet vision! Do not fade away;
Linger, until my heart shall take
Into itself the summer day,
And all the beauty of the lake;
Linger until upon my brain
Is stamped an image of the scene,
Then fade into the air again,
And be as if thou hadst not been.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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