Only a glimpse of mountain road
That followed where a river flowed;
Only a glimpse—then on we passed
Skirting the forest dim and vast.
I closed my eyes. On rushed the train
Into the dark, then out again,
Startling the song-birds as it flew
The wild ravines and gorges through.
But, heeding not the dangerous way
O’erhung by sheer cliffs, rough and gray,
I only saw, as in a dream,
The road beside the mountain stream.
No smoke curled upward in the air,
No meadow-lands stretched broad and fair;
But towering peaks rose far and high,
Piercing the clear, untroubled sky.
Yet down the yellow, winding road
That followed where the river flowed,
I saw a long procession pass
As shadows over bending grass.
The young, the old, the sad, the gay,
Whose feet had worn that narrow way,
Since first within the dusky glade
Some Indian lover wooed his maid;
Or silent crept from tree to tree—
Spirit of stealthy vengeance, he!
Or breathless crouched while through the brake
The wild deer stole his thirst to slake.
The barefoot school-boys rushing out,
An eager, crowding, roisterous rout;
The sturdy lads; the lassies gay
As bobolinks in merry May;
The farmer whistling to his team
When first the dawn begins to gleam;
The loaded wains that one by one
Drag slowly home at set of sun;
Young lovers straying hand in hand
Within a fair, enchanted land;
And many a bride with lingering feet;
And many a matron calm and sweet;
And many an old man bent with pain;
And many a solemn funeral train;
And sometimes, red against the sky,
An army’s banners waving high!
All mysteries of life and death
To which the spirit answereth,
Are thine, O lonely mountain road,
That followed where the river flowed!