Classic and Contemporary Poetry
VAUCLUSE, by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL Poet's Biography First Line: The laurel throws its locks around thy grave Last Line: With all a torrent's grandeur to the deep. Subject(s): Vaucluse, France | ||||||||
THE laurel throws its locks around thy grave As freshly, as when erst thou lingered there, And plucked the early flowers to crown thy hair, Or gathered cresses from the glassy wave, That winds through hills of olive, vine, and grain, Stealing away from Vaucluse' lonely dell, Now murmuring scantily, now in the swell Of April foaming onward to the plain -- Laura! Thy consecrated bough is bright, As when thy Petrarch tuned his soft lute by, And lit his torch in that dissolving light, Which darted from his only Sun -- thine eye; Thy leaf is still as green, thy flower as gay, Thy berry of as deep a tint, as when Thou moved a Goddess in the walks of Men, And o'er thy poet held unbounded sway -- Methinks I hear, as from the hills descend The deepening shadows and the blue smoke curls, And waving forests with the light winds bend, And flows the brook in softer leaps and whirls -- Methinks I hear that voice of love complaining, In faint and broken accents, of his hours Of lonely sorrow, and of thy disdaining And half averted glances, till the bowers Are pregnant with the hymn, and every rose With fresher dew, as if in weeping flows, And every lily seems to wear a hue Of paler tenderness, and deeper glows The pink's carnation, and a purer blue Melts on the modest rosemary, the wind Whispers a sweeter echo, and the stream Spouts stiller from its well; while from behind The snow-clad alpine summits rolls the moon, Careering onward to her cloudless noon, In fullest orb of silver, and her beam Casts o'er the vale long shadows from the pine, The rock, the spire, the castle, and away, Beyond thy towers, Avignon! proudly shine The broad Rhone's foaming channels, in their play Through green and willowed islands, while they sweep, Descending on their bold, resistless way, And heaving high their crest in wild array, With all a torrent's grandeur to the deep. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...VAUCLUSE by WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER THE CORAL GROVE by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL TO SENECA LAKE by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL A PICTURE by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL A PICTURE: VALLEY OF CATSKILL RIVER NORTH OF THE CATSKILL MOUNTAINS by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL A PLATONIC BACCHANAL SONG by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL A TALE by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL A TRIBUTE TO THE BRAVE by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL AN ODE TO MUSIC: 1 by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL AN ODE TO MUSIC: 10 by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL |
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