Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE PINELANDS OF MONMOUTH, by EDWARD NELSON TEALL


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE PINELANDS OF MONMOUTH, by                    
First Line: I have scaled the steeps of sussex
Last Line: In the pinelands by the sea!
Subject(s): New Jersey


I have scaled the steeps of Sussex,
Breasted Greenwood's limpid wave,
Known the wooded Watchung ranges'
Facile moods, or gay or grave;
In the years of budding manhood
I have dreamed a future's dream
On the midland heights of Mercer
Where old Princeton's towers gleam.

From the Hackensack's headwaters
To the bay of Delaware,
From the Hook aspiring seaward
To her western marches fair,
I have pilgrimmed Jersey's province
To her uttermost confines --
Knowing last, and holding dearest
Monmouth's fairyland of pines.

I have heard the hymn of labor
From her swarming cities rise,
Heard the softer notes and sweeter
Of her songbirds greet the skies;
I have seen white winter mantle
Wondrouswise her fertile fields,
And the suns of summer urge them
To most opulent of yields:

Fruit and grain, and luscious berries
Of her tropic tempered south,
And the royal melon, making
Heaven of a human mouth.
She is rich beyond all dreaming,
Dowered past all States is she --
And the fairest of her gems is
Monmouth's pineland, by the sea.

Monmouth's pineland! Words of magic
And of melody compound!
There's the lave of lisping waters
Running through their mellow sound;
Song of Whippoorwill's weird music
As of silver litten nights
Plaining in the woodland arches
He conducts his pagan rites.

Beauty, wed with wealth of power --
Melody with might made one,
As beyond the eastern gateway
Restless tides of ocean run.
And the salt gale of Atlantic,
Mingling with the pine breath free,
Sings through Monmouth's open temple,
In the pinelands by the sea!





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