ROCKS, trees and rocks; and down a mossy stone The murmuring ooze and trickle of a stream Through bushes, where the mountain spring lies lone,-- A gleaming cairngorm where the shadows dream,-- And one wild road winds like a saffron seam. Here sang the thrush, whose pure, mellifluous note Dropped golden sweetness on the fragrant June; Here cat--and blue-bird and wood-sparrow wrote Their presence on the silence with a tune; And here the fox drank 'neath the mountain moon. Frail ferns and dewy mosses and dark brush-- Impenetrable briers, deep and dense, And wiry bushes,--brush, that seemed to crush The struggling saplings with its tangle, whence Sprawled out the ramble of an old rail-fence. A wasp buzzed by; and then a butterfly In orange and amber, like a floating flame; And then a man, hard-eyed and very sly, Gaunt-checked and haggard and a little lame, With an old rifle, down the mountain came. He listened, drinking from a flask he took Out of the ragged pocket of his coat; Then all around him cast a stealthy look; Lay down; and watched an eagle soar and float, His fingers twitching at his hairy throat. The shades grew longer; and each Cumberland height Loomed, framed in splendours of the dolphin dusk. Around the road a horseman rode in sight; Young, tall, blonde-bearded. Silent, grim, and brusque, He in the thicket aimed --The gun ran husk; And echoes barked among the hills and made Repeated instants of the shot's distress. -- then silence -- and the trampled bushes swayed; -- Then silence, packed with murder and the press Of distant hoofs that galloped riderless. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SPIRIT OF '76 by WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS TO W. HOHENZOLLERN: A PLEA by FRANKLIN PIERCE ADAMS WESTERN MORNING by WILLIMINA L. ARMSTRONG THE LAST MAN: SPEAKER'S MEANING DIMLY DESCRIBED by THOMAS LOVELL BEDDOES ECCLESIASTES by OLD TESTAMENT BIBLE THE DISTURBED WASP; TO WILLIAM BEEBE by ANNE MILLAY BREMER SCENES FROM THE MAGICO PRODIGIOSO by PEDRO CALDERON DE LA BARCA |