I live, I move, I know not how, nor why,
Float as a transient bubble on the air,
As fades the eventide I, too, must die;
I came, I know not whence; I journey, where?
The Fallen Tree.
I passed along a mountain road,
Which led me through a wooded glen,
Remote from dwelling or abode
And ordinary haunts of men;
And wearied from the dust and heat.
Beneath a tree, I found a seat.
The tree, a tall majestic spruce,
Which had, perhaps for centuries,
Withstood, without a moment's truce,
The wing-ed warfare of the breeze;
A monarch of the solitude,
Which well might grace the noblest wood.
Beneath its cool and welcome shade,
Protected from the noontide rays,
The birds amid its branches played
And caroled forth their twittering praise;
A squirrel perched upon a limb
And chattered with loquacious vim.
E'er yet that selfsame week had sped,
On my return, I sought its shade;
But where it reared its form, instead;
A fallen monarch I surveyed,
Prostrate and broken on the ground,
Nor longer cast its shade around.
Uprooted and disheveled, there
The monarch of the forest lay;
As if in desolate despair
Its last resistance fell away,
And overwhelmed, in evil hour
Went down before the tempest's power.
Such are the final works of fate;
The birds to other branches flew;
And man, whatever his estate,
Must face that same mutation, too!
To-day, I stand erect and tall,
The morrow--may record my fall.
There is an Air of Majesty.
There is an air of majesty,
A bearing dignified and free,
About the mountain peaks;
Each crag of weather-beaten stone
Presents a grandeur of its own
To him who seeks.
There is a proud, defiant mein,
Expressive, stern, and yet serene,
About the precipice;
Whose rugged form looks grimly down,
And answers, with an austere frown
The sunlight's kiss.
The mountain, with the snow bank crowned;
The gorge, abysmal and profound;
Impress with aspect grand:
With unfeigned reverence I see
In canon and declivity
The All-Wise Hand.
Think Not that the Heart is Devoid of Emotion.
Think not that the heart is devoid of emotion,
Because of a countenance rugged and stern,
The bosom may hide the most fervent devotion,
As shadowy forests hide floweret and fern;
As the pearls which are down in the depths of the ocean,
The heart may have treasures which few can discern.
Think not the heart barren, because no reflection
Is flashed from the depths of its secret embrace;
External appearance may baffle detection,
And yet the heart beat with an ethical grace:
The breast may be charged with the truest affection
And never betray it by action or face.
[Illustration:
"Where nature's chemistry distills,
The fountain and the laughing rills."