THE gray stems rise, the branches braid A covering of deepest shade. Beneath these old, inviolate trees There comes no stealthy, sliding breeze, To overhear their mysteries. Steeped in the fragrant breath of leaves, My heart a hermit peace receives: The sombre forest thrusts a screen My refuge and the world between, And beds me in its balmy green. No fret of life may here intrude, To vex the sylvan solitude. Pure spirits of the earth and air, From hollow trunk and bosky lair Come forth, and hear your lover's prayer! Come, Druid soul of ancient oak, Thou, too, hast felt the thunder-stroke; Come, Hamadryad of the beech, Nymph of the burning maple, teach My heart the solace of your speech! Alas! the sylvan ghosts preserve The natures of the race they serve Not only Dryads, chaste and shy, But piping Fauns, come dancing nigh, And Satyrs of the shaggy thigh. Across the calm, the holy hush, And shadowed air, there darts a flush Of riot, from the lawless brood, And rebel voices in my blood Salute these orgies of the wood. Not sacred thoughts alone engage The saint in silent hermitage: The soul within him heavenward strives, Yet strong, as in profaner lives, The giant of the flesh survives. From Nature, as from human haunts, That giant draws his sustenance. By her own elves, in woodlands wild She sees her robes of prayer defiled: She is not purer than her child. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BLACK MONKEY by KATHERINE MANSFIELD SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY: EPILOGUE by EDGAR LEE MASTERS RETALIATION by OLIVER GOLDSMITH THE BUGLER'S FIRST COMMUNION by GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS THERE IS NOTHING STRANGE by ARCHILOCHUS THE EPIPHANY by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD THE SCYTHE STRUCK BY LIGHTING by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN THE WANDERER: 6. PALINGENSIS: A PSALM OF CONFESSION by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON |