Picture Songs
by
I.
A pale green sky is gleaming;
The steely stars are few;
The moorland pond is steaming
A mist of gray and blue.
Along the pathway lonely
My horse is walking slow;
Three living creatures only,
He, I, and a home-bound crow!
The moon is hardly shaping
Her circle in the fog;
A dumb stream is escaping
Its prison in the bog.
But in my heart are ringing
Tones of a lofty song;
A voice that I know, is singing,
And my heart all night must long.
II.
Over a shining land–
Once such a land I knew–
Over its sea, by a soft wind fanned,
The sky is all white and blue.
The waves are kissing the shores,
Murmuring love and for ever;
A boat gleams green, and its timeful oars
Flash out of the level river.
Oh to be there with thee
And the sun, on wet sands, my love!
With the shining river, the sparkling sea,
And the radiant sky above!
III.
The autumn winds are sighing
Over land and sea;
The autumn woods are dying
Over hill and lea;
And my heart is sighing, dying,
Maiden, for thee.
The autumn clouds are flying
Homeless over me;
The nestless birds are crying
In the naked tree;
And my heart is flying, crying,
Maiden, to thee.
The autumn sea is crawling
Up the chilly shore;
The thin-voiced firs are calling
Ghostily evermore:
Maiden, maiden! I am falling
Dead at thy door.
IV.
The waters are rising and flowing
Over the weedy stone–
Over it, over it going:
It is never gone.
Waves upon waves of weeping
Went over the ancient pain;
Glad waves go over it leaping–
Still it rises again!