THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, To me did seem Apparelled in celestial light, The glory and the freshness of a dream. Turn wheresoe'er I may, By night or day, The things which I have seen I now can see no more! II. The rainbow comes and goes, And lovely is the rose; The moon doth with delight Look round her when the heavens are bare; Waters on a starry night Are beautiful and fair; The sunshine is a glorious birth; But yet I know, where'er I go, That there hath past away a glory from the earth. III. Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song, As to the tabor's sound, To me alone there came a thought of grief; The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep; Give themselves up to jolity, And with the heart of May Doth every beast keep holiday! Thou child of joy, 25 30 Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy shepherd boy! IV. Ye blessed creatures, I have heard the call Ye to each other make; I see The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee; My head hath its coronal; The fulness of your bliss, I feel-I feel it all. While the earth herself is adorning This sweet May morning; And the children are pulling, On every side, In a thousand valleys far and wide, Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm : I hear, I hear, with joy I hear! But there's a tree, of many, one, A single field which I have look'd upon, Both of them speak of something that is gone; Doth the same tale repeat. Whither is fled the visionary gleam? Where is it now, the glory and the dream? V. Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: And cometh from afar; Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, 35 40 45 50 55 60 But trailing clouds of glory do we come Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close Upon the growing boy, But he beholds the light, and whence it flows, — The youth, who daily farther from the east And by the vision splendid Is on his way attended; 65 70 At length the man perceives it die away, 75 VI. Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own; And no unworthy aim, The homely nurse doth all she can To make her foster-child, her inmate man, VII. Behold the child among his new-born blisses, A six years' darling of a pigmy size! See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies, A mourning or a funeral; And this hath now his heart, Then will he fit his tongue To dialogues of business, love, or strife; But it will not be long Ere this be thrown aside, And with new joy and pride The little actor cons another part, |