Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
America: Vols. XXV–XXIX. 1876–79.
My Own Dark Genesee
By William Henry Cuyler Hosmer (18141877)T
Charms richer than mine own:
Sun, moon, and stars of brighter glow,
And winds of gentler tone;
And parting from each olden haunt,
Familiar rock and tree,
From that sweet vale I wandered far—
Washed by the Genesee.
Though birds, like harps in tune,
Lulled Winter on a couch of flowers
Clad in the garb of June.
In vain on reefs of coral broke
The glad waves of the sea;
For, like thy voice they sounded not,
My own dark Genesee!
The lemon-tree and lime,
And the warm sky above me threw
The blue of summer-time;
I thought of my loved northern home,
And wished for wings to flee
Where frost-bound, between frozen banks,
Lay hushed the Genesee.
My throbbing bosom yearned,
And ere the flight of many moons
My steps I homeward turned;
My heart, to joy a stranger long,
Was tuned to rapture’s key,
When ear the murmur heard once more
Of my own Genesee.
May others lure away
To chase the phantom of renown
Throughout their little day;
I would not, for a palace proud
And slave of pliant knee,
Forsake a cabin in thy vale,
My own dark Genesee.