When life contracts into a vulgar span, And human nature tires to be a man, I thank the Gods for Greece, That permanent realm of peace. For as the rising moon far in the night Chequers the shade with her forerunning light, So in my darkest hour my senses seem To catch from her Acropolis a gleam. Greece, who am I that should remember thee, Thy Marathon, and thy Thermopylae? Is my life vulgar, my fate mean, Which on such golden memories can lean? THE FUNERAL BELL One more is gone Out of the busy throng That tread these paths; The church-bell tolls, Its sad knell rolls To many hearths. Flower-bells toll not, Their echoes roll not Upon my ear; There still perchance That gentle spirit haunts A fragrant bier. Low lies the pall, Lowly the mourners all Their passage grope; No sable hue Mars the serene blue Of heaven’s cope. In distant dell Faint sounds the funeral bell; A heavenly chime; Some poet there Weaves the light-burthened air Into sweet rhyme. THE SUMMER RAIN My books I’d fain cast off, I cannot read, ’Twixt every page my thoughts go stray at large Down in the meadow, where is richer feed, And will not mind to hit their proper targe. Plutarch was good, and so was Homer too, Our Shakespeare’s life were rich to live again, What Plutarch read, that was not good nor true, Nor Shakespeare’s books, unless his books were men. Here while I lie beneath this walnut bough, What care I for the Greeks or for Troy town, If juster battles are enacted now Between the ants upon this hummock’s crown? Bid Homer wait till I the issue learn, If red or black the gods will favor most, Or yonder Ajax will the phalanx turn, Struggling to heave some rock against the host. Tell Shakespeare to attend some leisure hour, For now I’ve business with this drop of dew, And see you not, the clouds prepare a shower,-- I’ll meet him shortly when the sky is blue. This bed of herdsgrass and wild oats was spread Last year with nicer skill than monarchs use, A clover tuft is pillow for my head, And violets quite overtop my shoes. And now the cordial clouds have shut all in, And gently swells the wind to say all’s well; The scattered drops are falling fast and thin, Some in the pool, some in the flower-bell. I am well drenched upon my bed of oats; But see that globe come rolling down its stem, Now like a lonely planet there it floats, And now it sinks into my garment’s hem. Drip, drip the trees for all the country round, And richness rare distils from every bough; The wind alone it is makes every sound, Shaking down crystals on the leaves below.