So palpable, I've seen those unshorn few, The six old willows at the causey's end (Such trees Paul Potter never dreamed nor drew), 255 Through this dry mist their checkering shadows send, Striped, here and there, with many a long-drawn thread, Where streamed through leafy chinks the trembling red, Past which, in one bright trail, the hang-bird's flashes blend. Yes, dearer far thy dust than all that e'er, 260 Beneath the awarded crown of victory, Gilded the blown Olympic charioteer; Though lightly prized the ribboned parchments three, Yet _collegisse juvat_, I am glad That here what colleging was mine I had,-- 265 It linked another tie, dear native town, with thee! Nearer art thou than simply native earth, My dust with thine concedes a deeper tie; A closer claim thy soil may well put forth, Something of kindred more than sympathy; 270 For in thy bounds I reverently laid away That blinding anguish of forsaken clay, That title I seemed to have in earth and sea and sky. That portion of my life more choice to me (Though brief, yet in itself so round and whole) 275 Than all the imperfect residue can be;-- The Artist saw his statue of the soul Was perfect; so, with one regretful stroke, The earthen model into fragments broke, And without her the impoverished seasons roll. 280 THE OAK What gnarled stretch, what depth of shade, is his! There needs no crown to mark the forest's king; How in his leaves outshines full summer's bliss! Sun, storm, rain, dew, to him their tribute bring, Which he with such benignant royalty 5 Accepts, as overpayeth what is lent; All nature seems his vassal proud to be, And cunning only for his ornament. How towers he, too, amid the billowed snows, An unquelled exile from the summer's throne, 10 Whose plain, uncinctured front more kingly shows, Now that the obscuring courtier leaves are flown. His boughs make music of the winter air, Jewelled with sleet, like some cathedral front Where clinging snow-flakes with quaint art repair 15 The dents and furrows of time's envious brunt. How doth his patient strength the rude March wind Persuade to seem glad breaths of summer breeze, And win the soil, that fain would be unkind, To swell his revenues with proud increase! 20 He is the gem; and all the landscape wide (So doth his grandeur isolate the sense) Seems but the setting, worthless all beside, An empty socket, were he fallen thence.