Page:Poems, now first collected, Stedman, 1897.djvu/119

THE DEATH OF BRYANT This was not Thyrsis! no, the minstrel lone

And reverend, the woodland singer hoar,

Who was dear Nature's nursling, and the priest

Whom most she loved; nor had his office ceased

But for her mandate: "Seek again thine own;

The walks of men shall draw thy steps no more!"

Softly, as from a feast

The guest departs that hears a low recall,

He went, and left behind his harp and coronal.

"Return!" she cried, "unto thine own return!

Too long the pilgrimage; too long the dream

In which, lest thou shouldst be companionless,

Unto the oracles thou hadst access,—

The sacred groves that with my presence yearn."

The voice was heard by mountain, dell, and stream,

Meadow and wilderness—

All fair things vestured by the changing year,

Which now awoke in joy to welcome one most dear.

"He comes!" declared the unseen ones that haunt

The dark recesses, the infinitude 99