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Composed 1842.

1842.

AIREY-FORCE VALLEY.

Published 1842.

-Not a breath of air

Ruffles the bosom of this leafy glen.

From the brook's margin, wide around, the trees
Are steadfast as the rocks; the brook itself,
Old as the hills that feed it from afar,

Doth rather deepen than disturb the calm
Where all things else are still and motionless.
And yet, even now, a little breeze, perchance
Escaped from boisterous winds that rage without,
Has entered, by the sturdy oaks unfelt,

But to its gentle touch how sensitive

Is the light ash! that, pendent from the brow
Of yon dim cave, in seeming silence makes

A soft eye-music of slow-waving boughs,

Powerful almost as vocal harmony

To stay the wanderer's steps and soothe his thoughts.

Composed 1842.

A POFT!-He hath put his heart to school,

Published 1842.

Nor dares to move unpropped upon the staff
Which Art hath lodged within his hand-must laugh

By precept only, and shed tears by rule.

Thy Art be Nature; the live current quaff,
And let the groveller sip his stagnant pool,
In fear that else, when Critics grave and cool
Have killed him, Scorn should write his epitaph.
How does the Meadow-flower its bloom unfold?
Because the lovely little flower is free

Down to its root, and, in that freedom, bold;
And so the grandeur of the Forest-tree
Comes not by casting in a formal mould,
But from its own divine vitality.

TO THE CLOUDS.

Composed 1842.

Published 1842.

ARMY of Clouds! ye winged Host in troops
Ascending from behind the motionless brow
Of that tall rock, (83) as from a hidden world,
O whither in such eagerness of speed?
What seek ye, or what shun ye? of the gale
Companions, fear ye to be left behind,
Or racing o'er your blue ethereal field
Contend ye with each other? of the sea
Children, thus post ye over vale and height
To sink upon your mother's lap-and rest?
Or were ye rightlier hailed, when first mine eyes
Beheld in your impetuous march the likeness
Of a wide army pressing on to meet
Or overtake some unknown enemy?-
But your smooth motions suit a peaceful aim;
And Fancy, not less aptly pleased, compares
Your squadrons to an endless flight of birds
Aerial, upon due migration bound
To milder climes; or rather do ye urge
In caravan your hasty pilgrimage
To pause at last on more aspiring heights
Than these, and utter your devotion there
With thunderous voice? Or are ye jubilant,
And would ye, tracking your proud lord the Sun,
Be present at his setting; or the pomp
Of Persian mornings would ye fill, and stand
Poising your splendours high above the heads
Of worshippers kneeling to their up-risen God?
Whence, whence, ye Clouds! this eagerness of speed?
Speak, silent creatures. They are gone, are fled,
Buried together in yon gloomy mass

That loads the middle heaven; and clear and bright
And vacant doth the region which they thronged
Appear; a calm descent of sky conducting

Down to the unapproachable abyss,

Down to that hidden gulf from which they rose
To vanish-fleet as days and months and years,
Fleet as the generations of mankind,
Power, glory, empire, as the world itself,
The lingering world, when time hath ceased to be.
But the winds roar, shaking the rooted trees,
And see! a bright precursor to a train
Perchance as numerous, overpeers the rock
That sullenly refuses to partake

Of the wild impulse. From a fount of life
Invisible, the long procession moves
Luminous or gloomy, welcome to the vale
Which they are entering, welcome to mine eye
That sees them, to my soul that owns in them,
And in the bosom of the firmament

O'er which they move, wherein they are contained,
A type of her capacious self and all

Her restless progeny.

A humble walk

Here is my body doomed to tread, this path,
A little hoary line and faintly traced,
Work, shall we call it, of the shepherd's foot
Or of his flock?-joint vestige of them both.
I pace it unrepining, for my thoughts
Admit no bondage and my words have wings.
Where is the Orphean lyre, or Druid harp,
To accompany the verse? The mountain blast
Shall be our hand of music; he shall sweep
The rocks, and quivering trees, and billowy lake,
And search the fibres of the caves, and they
Shall answer, for our song is of the Clouds
And the wind loves them; and the gentle gales-
Which by their aid re-clothe the naked lawn

With annual verdure, and revive the woods,
And moisten the parched lips of thirsty flowers-
Love them; and every idle breeze of air
Bends to the favourite burthen. Moon and stars
Keep their most solemn vigils when the Clouds
Watch also, shifting peaceably their place

Like bands of ministering Spirits, or when they lie,
As if some Protean art the change had wrought,
In listless quiet o'er the ethereal deep
Scattered, a Cyclades of various shapes
And all degrees of beauty. O ye Lightnings!
Ye are their perilous offspring; and the Sun-
Source inexhaustible of life and joy,
And type of man's far-darting reason, therefore
In old time worshipped as the God of Verse,
A blazing intellectual deity-

Loves his own glory in their looks, and showers
Upon that unsubstantial brotherhood
Visions with all but beatific light

Enriched-too transient were they not renewed
From age to age, and did not, while we gaze
In silent rapture, credulous desire

Nourish the hope that memory lacks not power
To keep the treasure unimpaired. Vain thought!
Yet why repine, created as we are

For joy and rest, albeit to find them only
Lodged in the bosom of eternal things?

1845.

FORTH FROM A Jutting ridge, AROUND WHOSE BASE."

Composed 1845.

Published 1845.

FORTH from a jutting ridge, around whose base
Winds our deep Vale, two heath-clad Rocks ascend
In fellowship, the loftiest of the pair

Rising to no ambitious height; yet both,

O'er lake and stream, mountain and flowery mead,
Unfolding prospects fair as human eyes
Ever beheld. Up-led with mutual help,
To one or other brow of those twin Peaks

Were two adventurous Sisters wont to climb,

And took no note of the hour while thence they gazed,
The blooming heath their couch, gazed, side by side,
In speechless admiration. I, a witness

And frequent sharer of their calm delight
With thankful heart, to either Eminence
Gave the baptismal name each Sister bore.
Now are they parted, far as Death's cold hand
Hath power to part the Spirits of those who love
As they did love. Ye kindred Pinnacles-
That, while the generations of mankind
Follow each other to their hiding-place
In time's abyss, are privileged to endure
Beautiful in yourselves, and richly graced
With like command of beauty-grant your aid
For MARY'S humble, SARAH'S silent, claim, (89)
That their pure joy in nature may survive
From age to age in blended memory.

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