I PUSH on through the shaggy wood, I round the hill: 't is here it stood; And there, beyond the crumbled walls, The shining Concord slowly crawls, Yet seems to make a passing stay, And gently spreads its lilied bay, Curbed by this green and reedy shore, Up toward the ancient homestead's door. But dumbly sits the shattered house, And makes no answer: man and mouse Long since forsook it, and decay Chokes its deep heart with ashes gray. On what was once a garden-ground Dull red-bloomed sorrels now abound; And boldly whistles the shy quail Within the vacant pasture's pale. Ah, strange and savage, where he shines, The sun seems staring through those pines That once the vanished home could bless With intimate, sweet loneliness. The ignorant, elastic sod The feet of them that daily trod Its roods hath utterly forgot: The very fireplace knows them not. For, in the weedy cellar, thick The ruined chimney's mass of brick Lies strown. Wide heaven, with such an ease Dost thou, too, lose the thought of these? Yet I, although I know not who Lived here, in years that voiceless grew Ere I was born, -- and never can, -- Am moved, because I am a man. O glorious gift of brotherhood! O sweet elixir in the blood, That makes us live with those long dead, Or hope for those that shall be bred Hereafter! No regret can rob My heart of this delicious throb; No thought of fortunes haply wrecked, Nor pang for nature's wild neglect. And, though the hearth be cracked and cold, Though ruin all the place enfold, These ashes that have lost their name Shall warm my life with lasting flame! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...VASHTI by JAMES WELDON JOHNSON APPELLATE JURISDICTION by MARIANNE MOORE CHARLES CARVILLE'S EYES by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON REALITY REQUIRES by WISLAWA SZYMBORSKA EGOISME A DEUX' by LOUISA SARAH BEVINGTON THE OLD MAN OF VERONA by CLAUDIAN THE SMILING MOUTH by CHARLES D'ORLEANS TWO OF A TRADE by SAMUEL WILLOUGHBY DUFFIELD ABRAHAM LINCOLN WALKS AT MIDNIGHT by NICHOLAS VACHEL LINDSAY |