The eastern sky of azure hue With colors bright were blended As we with quick and buoyant steps The Cumberland ascended. The air was breezy, fresh and warm; The morning was sublime; The ground was strewn with colored leaves -- For it was autumn time. We stopped and plucked some wintergreen We gathered pine cones brown, We paused awhile where chestnut trees Had dropped their harvest down. So pleasantly we'd passed the time While climbing up the slope We hardly realized it when We reached the mountain's top. Suddenly a beauteous lake Our wondering entranced; Upon its wave blown bosom The morning sunbeams danced. Half hidden by the reeds and ferns That yet were bright and green Bathing quite near the water's edge Wild ducks by us were seen. And clearly mirrored in the lake With leaves of varied hue Were the trees that stood upon its shore 'Neath heaven's dome of blue. We sat upon a spruce pine's trunk That had uprooted been By wind and storm and angled in The lake still and serene. We homeward went ere evening came, But nothing did we take With us except a string of fish From out the mountain lake. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...PRAYER TO THE OCEAN by GEORGE SANTAYANA STEVENSON'S BIRTHDAY by KATHERINE WISE MILLER THE WORMS AT HEAVEN'S GATE by WALLACE STEVENS THE DESERTED LOVER CONSOLETH HIMSELF ... by THOMAS WYATT CARMEN SYLVA by JOHANNA AMBROSIUS THE STEAM-ENGINE: CANTO 6. ON THE CORK PACKET, 1837 by T. BAKER |