Alfred H. Miles, ed. The Sacred Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907.
By IX Poems (1840). III. Former HomeCaroline Clive (18011873)
I
I stand again, the long estranged;
And gazing round me, ponder here
On all that has, and has not changed.
Naught altered in the aspects round;
But long familiar shapes to me
Are missing, which I fain had found.
Which not an eye could pass unmov’d;
The flow’ry bank, the fringing wood,
Which e’en the passer mark’d and lov’d.
Had dwelt the rocks high front upon,
I sought upon its warmer side
A vine we train’d—and that was gone.
Upon the river quick and fair,
I sought, ere long, a seat we raised
In childhood—but it was not there.
Its relics, or the winter’s snow—
And sitting where we sate together,
Again I watch’d the torrent flow.
In foam around yon jutting stone;
So arrowy shot they down the glen,
When here we pass’d the hours long flown.
From which, the day I parted hence,
I took a few green leaves, to be
My solace still through time and chance.
In sunlight, air, and beauty here;
While I in cities gazed upon
The wither’d leaves of that one year.
With deaths and partings, loss and pain;
And every object round me rings
Its mournful epitaph again.
Which only we have lov’d or known;
They flourish’d with our happier days—
They wither’d because we were gone.
Who’re scatter’d far upon the earth,
At whose young hands they once arose
Whose eyes gazed gleeful on their birth.
Those eyes in grief grown dim and hot,
And wand’ring through a stranger’s land,
Oft yearn’d to this remember’d spot.
The early spring of life is gone,
Gone is each youthful vanity,—
But what with years, oh what is won?
Where open’d first the heart of youth,
I recollect how high would glow
Its thoughts of Glory, Faith, and Truth—
How true to heav’n how warm to men.
Alas! I scarce forbear to hate
The colder breast I bring again.
Have moulded me since here I stood;
Ah! paint old feelings, rock sublime,
Speak life’s fresh accents, mountain flood!