Underwoods - Роберт Стивенсон

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the great streams the ships may go

      About men’s business to and fro.

      But I, the egg-shell pinnace, sleep

      On crystal waters ankle-deep:

      I, whose diminutive design,

      Of sweeter cedar, pithier pine,

      Is fashioned on so frail a mould,

      A hand may launch, a hand withhold:

      I, rather, with the leaping trout

      Wind, among lilies, in and out;

      I, the unnamed, inviolate,

      Green, rustic rivers, navigate;

      My dipping paddle scarcely shakes

      The berry in the bramble-brakes;

      Still forth on my green way I wend

      Beside the cottage garden-end;

      And by the nested angler fare,

      And take the lovers unaware.

      By willow wood and water-wheel

      Speedily fleets my touching keel;

      By all retired and shady spots

      Where prosper dim forget-me-nots;

      By meadows where at afternoon

      The growing maidens troop in June

      To loose their girdles on the grass.

      Ah! speedier than before the glass

      The backward toilet goes; and swift

      As swallows quiver, robe and shift

      And the rough country stockings lie

      Around each young divinity.

      When, following the recondite brook,

      Sudden upon this scene I look,

      And light with unfamiliar face

      On chaste Diana’s bathing-place,

      Loud ring the hills about and all

      The shallows are abandoned…

      IV

      It is the season now to go

      About the country high and low,

      Among the lilacs hand in hand,

      And two by two in fairy land.

      The brooding boy, the sighing maid,

      Wholly fain and half afraid,

      Now meet along the hazel’d brook

      To pass and linger, pause and look.

      A year ago, and blithely paired,

      Their rough-and-tumble play they shared;

      They kissed and quarrelled, laughed and cried,

      A year ago at Eastertide.

      With bursting heart, with fiery face,

      She strove against him in the race;

      He unabashed her garter saw,

      That now would touch her skirts with awe.

      Now by the stile ablaze she stops,

      And his demurer eyes he drops;

      Now they exchange averted sighs

      Or stand and marry silent eyes.

      And he to her a hero is

      And sweeter she than primroses;

      Their common silence dearer far

      Than nightingale and mavis are.

      Now when they sever wedded hands,

      Joy trembles in their bosom-strands

      And lovely laughter leaps and falls

      Upon their lips in madrigals.

      V – THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL

      A naked house, a naked moor,

      A shivering pool before the door,

      A garden bare of flowers and fruit

      And poplars at the garden foot:

      Such is the place that I live in,

      Bleak without and bare within.

      Yet shall your ragged moor receive

      The incomparable pomp of eve,

      And the cold glories of the dawn

      Behind your shivering trees be drawn;

      And when the wind from place to place

      Doth the unmoored cloud-galleons chase,

      Your garden gloom and gleam again,

      With leaping sun, with glancing rain.

      Here shall the wizard moon ascend

      The heavens, in the crimson end

      Of day’s declining splendour; here

      The army of the stars appear.

      The neighbour hollows dry or wet,

      Spring shall with tender flowers beset;

      And oft the morning muser see

      Larks rising from the broomy lea,

      And every fairy wheel and thread

      Of cobweb dew-bediamonded.

      When daisies go, shall winter time

      Silver the simple grass with rime;

      Autumnal frosts enchant the pool

      And make the cart-ruts beautiful;

      And when snow-bright the moor expands,

      How shall your children clap their hands!

      To make this earth our hermitage,

      A cheerful and a changeful page,

      God’s bright and intricate device

      Of days and seasons doth suffice.

      VI – A VISIT FROM THE SEA

      Far from the loud sea beaches

         Where he goes fishing and crying,

      Here in the inland garden

         Why is the sea-gull flying?

      Here are no fish to dive for;

         Here is the corn and lea;

      Here are the green trees rustling.

         Hie away home to sea!

      Fresh is the river water

         And quiet among the rushes;

      This is no home for the sea-gull

         But for the rooks and thrushes.

      Pity the bird that has wandered!

         Pity the sailor ashore!

      Hurry him home to the ocean,

         Let him come here no more!

      High on the sea-cliff ledges

         The white gulls are trooping and crying,

      Here among the rooks and roses,

         Why is the sea-gull flying?

      VII – TO A GARDENER

      Friend, in my mountain-side demesne

      My plain-beholding, rosy, green

      And linnet-haunted garden-ground,

      Let still the esculents abound.

      Let first the onion flourish there,

      Rose

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