And be the damp mould gently pressed Into my narrow place of rest. There through the long, long summer hours, The golden light should lie, And thick young herbs and groups of flowers Stand in their beauty by. The oriole should build and tell His love-tale close beside my cell; The idle butterfly Should rest him there, and there be heard And what if cheerful shouts at noon I know that I no more should see The season's glorious show, Nor would its brightness shine for me, But if, around my place of sleep, The friends I love should come to weep, Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom Should keep them lingering by my tomb. These to their softened hearts should bear And deeply would their hearts rejoice TO A WATERFOWL By William Cullen Bryant W HITHER, midst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way? Vainly the fowler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, As, darkly painted on the crimson sky, Thy figure floats along. Seek'st thou the plashy brink Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide, Or where the rocking billows rise and sink On the chafed ocean-side? There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,— The desert and illimitable air Lone wandering, but not lost. All day thy wings have fanned, At that far height the cold, thin atmosphere, Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land, Though the dark night is near. And soon that toil shall end; Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, And scream among thy fellows: reeds shall bend, Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest. Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heart Deeply has sunk the lesson thou hast given, And shall not soon depart. He who, from zone to zone, Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone, AN INVITATION TO THE COUNTRY By William Cullen Bryant LREADY, close by our summer dwelling, The Easter sparrow repeats her song; A merry warbler, she chides the blossoms The idle blossoms that sleep The bluebird chants, from the elm's long branches, Come, daughter mine, from the gloomy city, Though many a flower in the wood is waking, She pushes upward the sward already, No lays so joyous as these are warbled No pampered bloom of the green-house chamber Yet these sweet sounds of the early season, There is no glory in star or blossom Come, Julia dear, for the sprouting willows, THE GLADNESS OF NATURE S this a time to be cloudy and sad, When even the deep blue heavens look glad, And gladness breathes from the blossoming ground? There are notes of joy from the hang-bird and wren |