Poems (Hoffman)/Nature
NATURE.
Nature is wonderful, the light that playsIn every pleasing shape that eye could wish,Painting the sunrise with Aurora's blushAnd evening with the sunset's burning flames,Flooding the zenith as with burnished goldAnd e'en the gloaming with enchanting shadesThat though less brilliant yet within themselvesPossess distinct and fascinating charms,Is wonderful if we but paused to thinkWhat our bright world would be, deprived of light,Even the night would miss the twinkling lampsAnd mellow moonbeams; while the dayWould lose her all, for light is day; and darknessWould usurp her throne, hanging a sable curtain where beforeThe golden beams lost their identity in one unbroken flood, that swept adownAerial channels and through rifted clouds,Harmoniously blending earth and heaven.Take only light,—one blessing of our earth—Leaving all else, flowers, birds and trees, beautiful landscapes, homes of loveliness,Glittering gems and piles of hoarded wealth;What were all these without a ray of light?An idle mockery, through starless night blinded and groping, to exist were death,Roaming through flowery meadows, by cool brooksStumbling o'er paths that light would make sublime,Losing one's way within a hopeless maze,Thirsting with plenteous streams on either hand,Dying of hunger in green fields of corn,Take light, and day is night and life is deathComfort and happiness and friends are lostIn the dark labyrinth of starless night. The humblest weed in some dark crevice hidHolds in its narrow limits the same forcesThat control the mighty tree and bid it addYear after year the leaf, the twig, the branch,'Till 'neath its friendly shade, beasts of the field findShelter from Summer's scorching raysAnd the tired traveler reclines to rest.
It stands a living tree in miniatureLifting its tiny branches toward the heavens,Spreading its leaflets to the morning sunRearing its buds and blossoms, fruit and seeds, to live and flourish when it has decayed.We pass them by or tread them 'neath our feet,Yet Nature with her wealth of birds and flowers,Has in her heart a place for every weed;For her quick eyes require no microscopeTo note the varied wonders and delightsThat the Creator's humblest works possess.