Volume Iii Part 49 (2/2)

In dreamland then we found our joy, And so it seemed as 'twere the Bird That Helen in old times had heard At noon beneath the oaks of Troy.

O time far off, and yet so near!

It came to her in that hushed grove, It warbled while the wooing throve, It sang the song she loved to hear.

And now I hear its voice again, And still its message is of peace, It sings of love that will not cease-- For me it never sings in vain.

Frederick Locker-Lampson [1821-1895]

TO THE CUCKOO

O blithe New-comer! I have heard, I hear thee and rejoice.

O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird, Or but a wandering Voice?

While I am lying on the gra.s.s Thy twofold shout I hear; From hill to hill it seems to pa.s.s, At once far off, and near.

Though babbling only to the Vale Of suns.h.i.+ne and of flowers, Thou bringest unto me a tale Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring!

Even yet thou art to me No bird, but an invisible thing, A voice, a mystery;

The same whom in my school-boy days I listened to; that Cry Which made me look a thousand ways, In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove Through woods and on the green; And thou wert still a hope, a love; Still longed for, never seen.

And I can listen to thee yet; Can lie upon the plain And listen, till I do beget That golden time again.

O blessed Bird! the earth we pace Again appears to be An unsubstantial, faery place; That is fit home for Thee!

William Wordsworth [1770-1850]

THE EAGLE A Fragment

He clasps the crag with crooked hands; Close to the sun in lonely lands, Ringed with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls; He watches from his mountain walls, And like a thunderbolt he falls.

Alfred Tennyson [1809-1892]

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