As on a rugged hill, when evening falls, The skilled young shepherdess Waters the strange and beautiful plant That can scarcely spread its leaves So far from its lifegiving native springtime, So on my agile tongue love awakens The new flower of a strange language. To sing as best I can of you, So gracious and lovely, I give up being heard by my own countrymen And trade familiar Thames for the fair Arno. Love so willed it, and I, from the sighs of others, Know that love never willed in vain. Ah, if only my dull heart and stony breast were as fine a soil as for heavenly seed. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...CA' THE YOWES TO THE KNOWES by ROBERT BURNS THE RESOLVE by MARY LEE CHUDLEIGH LOVE IN THE WINDS by RICHARD HOVEY THE KLONDIKE by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON SPIRIT WHOSE WORK IS DONE (WASHINGTON CITY, 1865) by WALT WHITMAN |