My brow I bare then, and with slacken’d speed Can view the country pleasant on all sides, And to kind salutation give good heed: I ride as one who for his pleasure rides, And stroke the neck of my delighted steed, And seek what cheer the village inn provides.
An idle June day on the sunny Thames, Floating or rowing as our fancy led, Now in the high beams basking as we sped, Now in green shade gliding by mirror’d stems; By lock and weir and isle, and many a spot Of memoried pleasure, glad with strength and skill, Friendship, good wine, and mirth, that serve not ill The heavenly Muse, tho’ she requite them not:
I would have life--thou saidst--all as this day, Simple enjoyment calm in its excess, With not a grief to cloud, and not a ray Of passion overhot my peace to oppress; With no ambition to reproach delay, Nor rapture to disturb its happiness.
A man that sees by chance his picture, made As once a child he was, handling some toy, Will gaze to find his spirit within the boy, Yet hath no secret with the soul pourtray’d: He cannot think the simple thought which play’d Upon those features then so frank and coy; ’Tis his, yet oh! not his: and o’er the joy His fatherly pity bends in tears dismay’d.
Proud of his prime maybe he stand at best, And lightly wear his strength, or aim it high, In knowledge, skill and courage self-possest:— Yet in the pictured face a charm doth lie, The one thing lost more worth than all the rest, Which seeing, he fears to say _This child was I_.
Tears of love, tears of joy and tears of care, Comforting tears that fell uncomforted, Tears o’er the new-born, tears beside the dead, Tears of hope, pride and pity, trust and prayer, Tears of contrition; all tears whatsoe’er Of tenderness or kindness had she shed Who here is pictured, ere upon her head The fine gold might be turn’d to silver there.
The smile that charm’d the father hath given place Unto the furrow’d care wrought by the son; But virtue hath transform’d all change to grace: So that I praise the artist, who hath done A portrait, for my worship, of the face Won by the heart my father’s heart that won.
If I could but forget and not recall So well my time of pleasure and of play, When ancient nature was all new and gay, Light as the fashion that doth last enthrall,— Ah mighty nature, when my heart was small, Nor dream’d what fearful searchings underlay The flowers and leafy ecstasy of May, The breathing summer sloth, the scented fall: