Poems (Hinxman)/Thoughts in April, 1854
THOUGHTS IN APRIL, 1854.
The sunshine settles brooding on the fields;
Full-voiced, full-breasted, flow the southern winds;
The powers of Spring are up and through the land.
Full-voiced, full-breasted, flow the southern winds;
The powers of Spring are up and through the land.
They wake the tender primrose on the bank,
The cowslip nodding on the breezy croft;
They break the blue eggs in the budding hedge;
They fill the quivering nostrils of the fawn;
They set the lambs to race the daisied lea;
They lead the full-eyed leveret forth to play
On the wild outskirts of the wood, whose depths
Are trembling to the unseen turtle's voice;
They wake the turtle's voice—they waken love!
They waken life, new strength, rejoicing new!
O more! they waken, in our human hearts,
Deep instincts, prescience with remembrance linked:
The holier Future with the holy Past
They blend, and, of that wedded sweetness sown,
The inner Present hath its flowering-time,
As full of wandering fragrance and soft notes
As the green world without.
And this works on,—
These links of joy and loveliness unwind,
While posts the battle-challenge through the lands;
While, tracked by coiling smoke and foaming surf,
The thunderous ships rush panting to the war,
And nations, sitting by in still suspense,
Wait the first earthquake-shock, whose dying fall
This age, this order of the ancient world,
Perhaps, shall never know. So much the more,
O gentlest ministers of God, pursue
Your timely office, never needed more!
Ye quickening elements of life and strength,
Re-issuing from rank Autumn's clammy hold,
And iron discipline of Winter's hand,
Tell to the world,in over-growth so lush,
So_worn at root, your parable of hope;
Tell it of health, new virtue, worthier fruit,
Regenerate out of tempest and of pain.
And ye, O tender spirits of delight,
Abroad in earth and air! take up again
Your yearly echoes out of Eden's bowers,—
Press all your treasures out, in yearly aim
To crown with Eden's dower a few sweet days.
Poor striving Nature's claims again put forth,
Through her six thousand winters unresigned;
And let those musing souls, that, loving most
Her holy face, the deeper mourn its wounds,
Be free to catch, or dream they catch, a ray
Of that mute promise which on instinct waits,
To see the vision of a Summer's peace,
A Summer's joy—a Summer wide and long
Come up afar between the gates of war,
And spread, as spreads the river in the lake.
And unto simpler hearts, yet not less wise,
A homelier, not less sacred, lesson teach:
Show them the fledgeling sparrow's fearless wing;
Show them the little swallow's rosy breast
That, after cleaving leagues of ocean-wind,
Against its last year's home reclines at ease;
Show them, though doubt and danger hang without,
The touch of Blessing on the land at home;
Show them the meadows, thick with early grass;
Show them the basking furrow's mellow tilth,
The fair skies smiling o'er the sower's head;
And say—For ever lives, for ever rules,
The wakeful, heedful, permeating Love,
The unchanged, undying, all-disposing Love;
Love shapes the beauteous secret end, and works
Though they be hail and thunder, through the means;
Say—Though the nations stagger, yet for this
The "cords of man" are slackened not which bind
The single creature to its Father's breast;
That guardian wings around the single head
Are folded in the battle's rolling ranks
Closely as when it stooped in peaceful toil,
Or mid the kneeling household bowed in prayer.
The cowslip nodding on the breezy croft;
They break the blue eggs in the budding hedge;
They fill the quivering nostrils of the fawn;
They set the lambs to race the daisied lea;
They lead the full-eyed leveret forth to play
On the wild outskirts of the wood, whose depths
Are trembling to the unseen turtle's voice;
They wake the turtle's voice—they waken love!
They waken life, new strength, rejoicing new!
O more! they waken, in our human hearts,
Deep instincts, prescience with remembrance linked:
The holier Future with the holy Past
They blend, and, of that wedded sweetness sown,
The inner Present hath its flowering-time,
As full of wandering fragrance and soft notes
As the green world without.
And this works on,—
These links of joy and loveliness unwind,
While posts the battle-challenge through the lands;
While, tracked by coiling smoke and foaming surf,
The thunderous ships rush panting to the war,
And nations, sitting by in still suspense,
Wait the first earthquake-shock, whose dying fall
This age, this order of the ancient world,
Perhaps, shall never know. So much the more,
O gentlest ministers of God, pursue
Your timely office, never needed more!
Ye quickening elements of life and strength,
Re-issuing from rank Autumn's clammy hold,
And iron discipline of Winter's hand,
Tell to the world,in over-growth so lush,
So_worn at root, your parable of hope;
Tell it of health, new virtue, worthier fruit,
Regenerate out of tempest and of pain.
And ye, O tender spirits of delight,
Abroad in earth and air! take up again
Your yearly echoes out of Eden's bowers,—
Press all your treasures out, in yearly aim
To crown with Eden's dower a few sweet days.
Poor striving Nature's claims again put forth,
Through her six thousand winters unresigned;
And let those musing souls, that, loving most
Her holy face, the deeper mourn its wounds,
Be free to catch, or dream they catch, a ray
Of that mute promise which on instinct waits,
To see the vision of a Summer's peace,
A Summer's joy—a Summer wide and long
Come up afar between the gates of war,
And spread, as spreads the river in the lake.
And unto simpler hearts, yet not less wise,
A homelier, not less sacred, lesson teach:
Show them the fledgeling sparrow's fearless wing;
Show them the little swallow's rosy breast
That, after cleaving leagues of ocean-wind,
Against its last year's home reclines at ease;
Show them, though doubt and danger hang without,
The touch of Blessing on the land at home;
Show them the meadows, thick with early grass;
Show them the basking furrow's mellow tilth,
The fair skies smiling o'er the sower's head;
And say—For ever lives, for ever rules,
The wakeful, heedful, permeating Love,
The unchanged, undying, all-disposing Love;
Love shapes the beauteous secret end, and works
Though they be hail and thunder, through the means;
Say—Though the nations stagger, yet for this
The "cords of man" are slackened not which bind
The single creature to its Father's breast;
That guardian wings around the single head
Are folded in the battle's rolling ranks
Closely as when it stooped in peaceful toil,
Or mid the kneeling household bowed in prayer.
April, 1854.