Poems (Stoddard)/A Landscape
A LANDSCAPE.
BETWEEN me and the woods along the bayThe swallows circle through the darkling mist,The robins breast the grass, and they divideThis solitude with me. The rippling seaAnd sunset clouds, the sea gulls' flashing flightFrom looming isles beyond—I watch them nowWith a new sense. Where are the swallows' young,And where the robins' nests? Year after yearThey hover round this ancient house, and I,Within as heedless, saw the long years pass,Nor ever dreamed a day like this might come—A day when mourners go about the street For one who always loved his fellow-men.The windflower trembles in the woods, the sodIs full of violets, the orchards rainTheir scented blossoms. May unfolds its leaves—Nature's eternal mystery to renew.Must man be less than leaf or flower, and end?If I go hence, when this departed soulHas left no human tie to bind me now,When spring unfolds, and I recall his past,Will their remembrance lead me here again,To teach me that his spirit comes to showThat Nature is eternal for man's sake?