OH! scenes of my childhood, and dear to my heart, Ye green waving woods on the margin of Cart, How blest in the morning of life I have strayed, By the stream of the vale and the grass-covered glade! Then, then every rapture was young and sincere, Ere the sunshine of bliss was bedimmed by a tear, And a sweeter delight every scene seemed to lend, That the mansion of peace was the home of a FRIEND. Now the scenes of my childhood, and dear to my heart, All pensive I visit, and sigh to depart; Their flowers seem to languish, their beauty to cease, For a @3stranger@1 inhabits the mansion of peace. But hushed be the sigh that untimely complains, While Friendship and all its enchantment remains, While it blooms like the flower of a winterless clime, Untainted by chance, unabated by time. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...PORTRAIT OF ONE DEAD by CONRAD AIKEN HOLES BORED IN A WORKBAG BY THE SCISSORS by MARIANNE MOORE ON DONNE'S POETRY by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE EPICOENE; OR, THE SILENT WOMAN: FREEDOM IN DRESS by BEN JONSON CHORUS OF CLOUD-MAIDENS: STROPHE, FR. THE CLOUDS by ARISTOPHANES |