Poems (Sharpless)/"The Song of the Lark"
"THE SONG OF THE LARK"A PICTURE BY BRETON
Thrilled with a nameless bliss, behold her stand, The sturdy daughter of the stubborn soil;Her ready sickle in her sunburnt hand, Her skirt upkilted for her daily toil.
What aspiration wakes her sluggish brain, And lights a sudden wonder in her eyes,As all agape she listens to the rain Of rapturous trilling from dawn's rosy skies?
She has no words for the strange, happy thought, She only feels the dull, monotonous dayFrom that sweet bubbling melody hath caught A glow of beauty on its vapid gray.
Strange visions, vague and lovely, lift her heart Above life's penury and bitter need,As beneath springtide suns, to being start The tender leaflets of a buried seed.
Oh joy! that although earth is stern and dark And closely round the heavy feet may cling,The soul can spring beyond it, with yon lark, And rising up toward heaven, blithely sing.