Page:A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers.djvu/57

Rh At evening still the very stars seem but this maiden's emissaries and reporters of her progress.

Low in the eastern sky

Is set thy glancing eye;

And though its gracious light

Ne'er riseth to my sight,

Yet every star that climbs

Above the gnarled limbs

Of yonder hill,

Conveys thy gentle will.

Believe I knew thy thought,

And that the zephyrs brought

Thy kindest wishes through,

As mine they bear to you,

That some attentive cloud

Did pause amid the crowd

Over my head,

While gentle things were said.

Believe the thrushes sung,

And that the flower bells rung,

That herbs exhaled their scent,

And beasts knew what was meant,

The trees a welcome waved,

And lakes their margins laved,

When thy free mind

To my retreat did wind.

It was a summer eve,

The air did gently heave,

While yet a low hung cloud

Thy eastern skies did shroud;

The lightning's silent gleam,

Startling my drowsy dream,

Seemed like the flash

Under thy dark eyelash.