But now the creatures all seemed farther off,
No longer mine, nor like me; only there,
A gulph between us. I could yearn indeed,
Like other rich men, for a drop of dew
To cool this heat,—a drop of the early dew,
The irrecoverable child-innocence
(Before the heart took fire and withered life)
When childhood might pair equally with birds;
But now . . the birds were grown too proud for us!
Alas, the very sun forbids the dew.
And I, I had come back to an empty nest,
Which every bird’s too wise for. How I heard
My father’s step on that deserted ground,
His voice along that silence, as he told
The names of bird and insect, tree and flower,
And all the presentations of the stars
Across Valdarno, interposing still
‘My child,’ ‘my child.’ When fathers say ‘my child,’
’Tis easier to conceive the universe,
And life’s transitions down the steps of law.
I rode once to the little mountain-house
As fast as if to find my father there,
But, when in sight of’t, within fifty yards,
I dropped my horse’s bridle on his neck
And paused upon his flank. The house’s front
Was cased with lingots of ripe Indian corn
In tesselated order, and device
Of golden patterns: not a stone of wall
