Simply Poetry

Sometimes, my travels around the web land me in unexpected places. A recent jaunt found me in Google Book Land where I picked up this small souvenir called Wild Roses of Cape Ann: And Other Poems.

Wild Roses of Cape Ann: And Other Poems
By Lucy Larcom
Published by Houghton, Mifflin, 1880
Original from Harvard University
Digitized Sep 23, 2005
272 pages

For your reading pleasure, here are a few selections.

WHEN THE WOODS TURN BROWN

How will it be when the roses fade
Out of the garden and out of the glade?
When the fresh pink bloom of the sweet-brier wild,
That leans from the dell like the cheek of a child,
Is changed for dry hips on a thorny bush?
Then scarlet and carmine the groves will flush.

How will it be when the autumn flowers
Wither away from their leafless bowers;
When sun-flower and star-flower and golden-rod
Glimmer no more from the frosted sod,
And the hill-side nooks are empty and cold?
Then the forest-tops will be gay with gold.

How will it be when the woods turn brown,
Their gold and their crimson all dropped down,
And crumbled to dust? Oh then, as we lay
Our ear to earth's lips, we shall hear her say,
"In the dark, I am seeking new gems for my crown" --
We will dream of green leaves, when the woods turn brown.


SEA AND SKY

The Sea is wedded to the Sky,--
Element unto element:
She spreads above hime tenderly
Her blue, transparent tent.

The Sky is mated with the Sea:
In stormy tumult he ascends
Toward her retreating mystery:--
Not thus their being blends.

But when her deep, eternal calm
Enters into his restless heart,
Each mirrors back the other's charm;
Nearest, when most apart.


SEA-SIDE HYMN

Into the ocean of Thy peace,
Almighty One, my thoughts would flow;
Bid their unrestful murmuring cease,
And Thy great calmness let me know!

The world is bright and glad in Thee!
No hopeless gloom her face enshrouds;
Joy lights her mountains, thrills her sea,
And weaves gay tints through all her clouds.

The shadow, Father, is our own,
That sends across our path a stain:
The discord is in us alone,
That makes the echoing earth complain.

O God, how beautiful is life,
Since Thou its soul and sweetness art!
How dies its childish fret and strife
On thy all-harmonizing heart!

Leaving behind me dust and clay,
From selfish hindrances set free,
I find at last my broadening way
Unto my ocean-rest in Thee.

One soul with Thee foreevermore,
Borne high beyond the gulfs of death,--
A joy that ripples on Thy shore,--
With Life's vast hymn I bend my breath.


Simply Poetry!

C_A_B