Green Gatinais, 'neath whose shade the living waters shine, where gleams the thunderbolt in that confined sea, the canal that with its stroke the storm doth underline, if I have made so bold as to sing thee, pardon me. Not my portion of the world? Thou becomest it, art it now. I regard thee, understand thy soul, and sing of thee. Let him be who wills, I am of no one land, I trow. Since when has Ile-de-France paid me a salary? And Champagne and this Remois of my nativity, where of crafty Louis Eleventh I have paraded long the mare, and the ample, fresh expanse of Normandy, have they been more prodigal? If you fancy so, you're wrong. And the land where I was a sailor, the coast of Brittany (gravely and fervently in song I praised its scenes), the smallest obulus has never voted me. All the silver I saw there shone on the sides of its sardines. From Perigord, in turn, what profit did I draw? -- Truffles? Not every day. Santonge and Angoumois, (how fair they were, those days of France, O youthful I of vacations long ago) what funds did they supply? Turning to foreign lands, what has my verdict been? Stout Belgium -- Gallic blood its pulses doth attune: in truth I like thee well, O stubborn race Walloon -- has not marketed my wares for all its store of spleen. Has thrifty Holland e'er unsewed for me at all the plump heel of her sock with golden ecus full? From Italy, where I saw such treasures, did I gain more than the burning vow to view them once again? And what vantage have I gained from those lands of faery, those countries of a dream my pen doth importune? -- the Mountain, whose domain was wholly made by me, Olympus, Paradise, ah, and the moon, the moon? . . . Tenderly to these lands I vowed my singer's art, their grace, austerity, or languor to express, nor asked reward, but sang to guard the happiness wherewith each man well-born doth satisfy his heart. I hear this throbbing heart, spiritual and pure, wherein its mirrored self all Nature doth adore, and that I have, my friends, nor ever will abjure to basely compromise with silver I abhor. Land of grasses and of streams, green Gatinais, receive my homage. Thee I sing, nor look for any wage, whereof the golden wave of the canal, this eve, mirrors the moon that melts above thy foliage. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ON MY JOYFUL DEPARTURE FROM THE CITY OF COLOGNE by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE SONNET FOR A PICTURE by ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE EASTER DAY [IN ROME] by OSCAR WILDE THE WESTERN JOURNALIST by FRANKLIN PIERCE ADAMS VERSES WRITTEN ON THE BACK OF AN OLD VISITATION COPY OF ARMS by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD A PASSSGE TO ITALY by WILLIAM ROSE BENET |