Now on the summit rapt I stand,
The centre of the circling land.
See, around, above, below,
What beauties blaze, what colors glow!
Blending, intersecting, meeting,
Or in lengthen’d file retreating;
Slop’d, or, with abrupt abyss,
Scoop’d into chalky precipice;
Smooth, or variously emboss’d,
Bare, or with many a hedge-row cross’d,
Innumerous rise the hills around,
And shut the landscape’s farthest bound.
Swells, o’er all, the coping sky,
How grand, how vast a canopy!
Above of deep cerulean hue,
Low it bends to palest blue,
And, on the horizon bright,
Melts away in liquid white,
Where clouds, of downy texture, spread,
Pillows meet for angel’s head.
Now the restless eye may rove
From mead to mead, from grove to grove;
Now the village church it views
Nested in its ancient yews;
Fields with corn, or pasture, green,
And stripes of barren heath between;
Villas, farms; and, glimmering cool,
The glassy pond, or rushy pool.
Softly blue the distance fades
In aerial lights and shades.
All, that a painter’s eye can charm,
All, that a poet’s heart can warm,
The scul, at one excursive glance,
Scizes amid the wide expanse. –
Where the vale appears to rise
And mingle with the meeting skies,
Back’d by the chalk-pit’s snowy hue,
Guildford’s turrets meet the view,
Above impends the castle hoar,
Where Tradition’s babbling lore
Tells, that a Saxon king did keep
The rightful heir in dungeons deep.
On a rock, above the plain,
Rises Catherine’s ruin’d fane;
And, where yonder bold hill swells,
From out its deep-entangled dells,
Martha boasts her house of prayer;
Sister saints the maidens were,
Who, a time-worn legend says,
Themselves the hallow’d walls did raise,
And a wondrous hammer, still,
Tost, as they toil’d, from hill to hill.
Far away, pale Hindhead frowns,
With level ridge of sun-burnt downs:
With pointed summit, steep and high,
Towers fir-cinctur’d Crooksbury.
Gazing there, the mind recalls
Waverly’s old abbey-walls,
Or sees the oak’s rude branches wave
O’er Lud’s wild stream, and wizard cave.
Below, like one vast wavy mead,
The wooded plains of Sussex spread.
Is’t Fancy’s cheat, or can the eye,
Beyond, a gleam of sea descry?
Now I turn, where Hascombe vaunts
Its beeches bowers, and Dryad haunts,
Now, where, on Ewhust’s breezy mound,
Turn the tall windmill’s broad vans round,
And the distant tower of Leith
Looks o’er the subject land beneath.
Nearer as the eye returns,
Fresh beauties, raptur’d, it discerns,
Like the green, and sunny ocean,
Waving with a gentle motion,
The billowing barley, o’er the vale,
Varies with the varying gale,
While, in never-ending race,
Light and shade each other chase,
O’er its undulating face.
See, where two hills embracing meet,
And form a dingle at their feet,
Screen’d by elms and poplars tall,
A cottage rears its humble wall –
Now the steep my steps descend,
Now to the grassy dell I wend.
How chang’d the prospect! Naught is seen
Save azure sky, and hill-side green.
Where spreads the flock whose tinkling bell
Suits the lonely echoes well;
And the valley jocund rings,
While the blithe turf-cutter sings –
Oh, ye delicious solitudes,
Of peace the only true abodes,
Still charm my fancy, for to me
Nature is true luxury!
More fair to me yon bells of heath,
Than glowing India’s gaudiest wreath;
More sweet the breeze that sweeps the broom,
Than all Arabia’s soft perfume;
More bright the dew-drop on its stems,
Than rich Golconda’s radiant gems.
Then, since Nature, without cost,
Gives all, that wealth herself can boast,
Let me true to Nature prove,
Talk with her, in glade and grove;
By the babbling brook; and still
Woo her charms on Hydon Hill.
(Chauncey Hare Townsend)
More Poetry from Chauncey Hare Townsend:
Chauncey Hare Townsend Poems based on Topics: Light, Nature, Drawing & Painting, Faces, Sisters, Charm, War & Peace, Literature, Money & Wealth, Mind, Prayers- The Vernal Extasy (Chauncey Hare Townsend Poems)
- Farewell, farewell! to others give (Chauncey Hare Townsend Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: Light Poems, Mind Poems, Nature Poems, War & Peace Poems, Faces Poems, Money & Wealth Poems, Prayers Poems, Literature Poems, Poets Poems, Sisters Poems, Charm PoemsBased on Keywords: chalky, discerns, variously, vaunts, hedge-row, slop, windmill, palest, emboss, vans, sun-burnt