Page:Poems of Nature and Life.djvu/397

 THE KIVER REVISITED 387

Thy smooth and glassy breast gives back

The image of the same blue sky ; As brownly darkening o'er thy track,

The rocks o'erhangthee from on high.

O, why no longer in my breast

Dost thou a pleasing grief excite ? I see thee, but my soul's at rest ;

I view thee with a calm deli<rht.

��Have grander prospects made thee tame ?

Or hath experience me made dull ? Sweet stream, thou art in all the same ;

I still can deem thee beautiful.

But tears and raptures yield at last To weight of more substantial care ;

And love, more poor than in the past, Foregoes the luxury of despair.

Through Fancy's glass of magic dyes

So oft false colors have I seen. Which changed, when viewed with naked eyes,

From rosy red to faded green, —

So oft I've known fair skies o'ercast,

And the warm sunshine veiled in showers,

So oft have found a naked waste,

Where distance clothed the scene with flowers,-

So oft, ere youth's first years were past,

I laid my loved ones in the dust, That I have learned, fair stream, at last

To look on all things with distrust.

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