Sweet Auburn! when a gay and happy child,
Playing with nature like a favorite toy,
I loved thy haunts, — thy bowers so altered now!
Nine summers only on my eyes had smiled,
When to thy wilds, all unaccompanied,
Frequent I strayed, slighting more cultured paths,
Where glowed, mid wary steps, the weeded flowers,
I sought thy mossy banks — raised a green throne,
And wielding there the willow's flexile twig,
Sang idle songs, such as ring wildly forth
In carol light or sad from untried hearts,
To Woody Dell I strayed; not then the voice
Which since, in manly eloquence, has woke
Its echoes, met my ear, but the gay birds
Sent up clear notes of joy from bough to bough,
Unconscious, that those notes in after years
Would change to funeral hymns.
I climbed thy Hill,
Whose noble height look'd down o'er art and nature.
The city's spires stood out, bathed in the glow
Of distant sun-light, while the gentle Charles
Lay like a nursing child outstretched in joy,
Soft murmuring, beneath the waving boughs.
Then with a light but not unthinking mind,
A glancing eye, and busy foot descending
The wooded Hill, I sought the Giant's Grave,
On whose extended mound the wild flowers rose.
The soft anemone stood peeping there,
To woodland gaze the gentle snow-drop's peer,
And violets that owe their witching charm
To kindred with an azure eye, — and heaven.
And can it be the hand, the same small hand,
That with its soft and twining fingers loved
To cull the flowers on Auburn's leafy slopes,
That presses oft in serious thought my brow
Beneath the star-beam of a Southern sky?
Thou, too, how changed, sweet Auburn! then of life,
Now of the grave thou tell'st — thy bloom is mourning!
And with the wild bird's song the sob of woe
Mingles most sad. — — —
I ask no monument,
Or lettered urn, within thy classic shades.
Be thou to me as in my childish days
Clustered all o'er with bright imaginings.
Though solemn words have sanctified thy Dell,
Linking its grassy clods with thoughts of heaven,
Though with fastidious taste affection's hand
Has piled the costly marble on thy hills,
And carved it in thy vales; though the great dead,
Great in the intellect that cannot die,
Have made their bed with thee, to me thou art
Sweet Auburn, and I love thee as the nest
From whence I joyed to plume my youthful wings
And soar to man's high nature from the child's.
I ask no monument within thy shades.
The rustling branches of our Southern groves
Shall sooth my sleep of death, kindly as minds
That circle through thy famed and cultur'd bow'rs;
The Southern flower spring up as soft and pure
As thine; bright Southern birds a requiem pour
As rich and mournful as thy plumed quire;
And Southern hearts, God knows how fervently,
Breathe prayers and blessings on my humbler grave.
Playing with nature like a favorite toy,
I loved thy haunts, — thy bowers so altered now!
Nine summers only on my eyes had smiled,
When to thy wilds, all unaccompanied,
Frequent I strayed, slighting more cultured paths,
Where glowed, mid wary steps, the weeded flowers,
I sought thy mossy banks — raised a green throne,
And wielding there the willow's flexile twig,
Sang idle songs, such as ring wildly forth
In carol light or sad from untried hearts,
To Woody Dell I strayed; not then the voice
Which since, in manly eloquence, has woke
Its echoes, met my ear, but the gay birds
Sent up clear notes of joy from bough to bough,
Unconscious, that those notes in after years
Would change to funeral hymns.
I climbed thy Hill,
Whose noble height look'd down o'er art and nature.
The city's spires stood out, bathed in the glow
Of distant sun-light, while the gentle Charles
Lay like a nursing child outstretched in joy,
Soft murmuring, beneath the waving boughs.
Then with a light but not unthinking mind,
A glancing eye, and busy foot descending
The wooded Hill, I sought the Giant's Grave,
On whose extended mound the wild flowers rose.
The soft anemone stood peeping there,
To woodland gaze the gentle snow-drop's peer,
And violets that owe their witching charm
To kindred with an azure eye, — and heaven.
And can it be the hand, the same small hand,
That with its soft and twining fingers loved
To cull the flowers on Auburn's leafy slopes,
That presses oft in serious thought my brow
Beneath the star-beam of a Southern sky?
Thou, too, how changed, sweet Auburn! then of life,
Now of the grave thou tell'st — thy bloom is mourning!
And with the wild bird's song the sob of woe
Mingles most sad. — — —
I ask no monument,
Or lettered urn, within thy classic shades.
Be thou to me as in my childish days
Clustered all o'er with bright imaginings.
Though solemn words have sanctified thy Dell,
Linking its grassy clods with thoughts of heaven,
Though with fastidious taste affection's hand
Has piled the costly marble on thy hills,
And carved it in thy vales; though the great dead,
Great in the intellect that cannot die,
Have made their bed with thee, to me thou art
Sweet Auburn, and I love thee as the nest
From whence I joyed to plume my youthful wings
And soar to man's high nature from the child's.
I ask no monument within thy shades.
The rustling branches of our Southern groves
Shall sooth my sleep of death, kindly as minds
That circle through thy famed and cultur'd bow'rs;
The Southern flower spring up as soft and pure
As thine; bright Southern birds a requiem pour
As rich and mournful as thy plumed quire;
And Southern hearts, God knows how fervently,
Breathe prayers and blessings on my humbler grave.