Tells the release of waters, and the earth That Nature, with her delicate ear, hath heard The common herbs of pasture, and breathe out Of April and hunt violets; when the rain It be deem'd too idle, but the young may Read nature like the manuscript of heaven, And call the flowers its poetry. Ye spirits of habitual unrest, Go out! And read it when the "fever of the world" Hath made your hearts impatient, and, if life Hath yet one spring unpoisoned, it will be Like a beguiling music to its flow, And you will no more wonder that I love To hunt for violets in the April time. THE BELFRY PIGEON. "Mine eyes are sick of this perpetual flow SHELLEY. ON the cross beam under the Old South bell In summer and winter that bird is there, "Tis a bird I love, with its brooding note, Whatever is rung on that noisy bell— The dove in the belfry must hear it well. When the tongue swings out to the midnight moonWhen the sexton cheerly rings for noon When the clock strikes clear at morning lightWhen the child is waked with "nine at night"When the chimes play soft in the Sabbath air, Filling the spirit with tones of prayer— Whatever tale in the bell is heard, He broods on his folded feet unstirred, Or rising half in his rounded nest, He takes the time to smooth his breast, And sleeps as the last vibration dies. Sweet bird! I would that I could be I tread, like thee, the crowded street; Canst smooth thy feathers on thy breast, I would that in such wings of gold I would I could look down unmoved, (Unloving as I am unloved,) And while the world throngs on beneath, And never sad with others' sadness, |