Sweet village! where my early days were pass’d,
Though parted long, we meet, we meet at last!
Like friends, imbrown’d by many a sun and wind,
Much changed in mien, but more in heart and mind,
Fair, after many years, thy fields appear,
With joy beheld, but not without a tear.
I met thy little river miles before
I saw again my natal cottage door:
Unchanged as truth, the river welcomed home
The wanderer of the sea’s heart-breaking foam;
But the changed cottage, like a time-tried friend,
Smote on my heart-strings, at my journey’s end.
For now no lilies bloom the door beside!
The very house-leek on the roof hath died;
The window’d gable’s ivy bower is gone,
The rose departed from the porch of stone;
The pink, the violet, have fled away,
The polyanthus and auricula!
And round my home, once bright with flowers, I found
Not one square yard, one foot of garden ground.
Path of the quiet fields! that oft of yore
Call’d me at morn on Shenstone’s page to pore;
Oh! poor man’s pathway! where, “at evening’s close,”
He stopp’d to pluck the woodbine and the rose,
Shaking the dew-drop from the wild-brier bowers,
That stoop’d beneath their load of summer flowers,
Then eyed the west, still bright with fading flame,
As whistling homeward by the wood he came;
Sweet, dewy, sunny, flowery footpath, thou
Art gone for ever, like the poor man’s cow!
No more the wandering townsman’s Sabbath smile,
No more the hedger, waiting on the stile
For tardy Jane; no more the muttering bard,
Startling the heifer near the lone farm-yard;
No more the pious youth, with book in hand,
Spelling the words he fain would understand,—
Shall bless thy mazes, when the village bell
Sounds o’er the river, soften’d up the dell.
Here youngling fishers, in the grassy lane,
Purloin’d their tackle from the brood-mare’s mane;
And truant urchins, by the river’s brink,
Caught the fledged throstle as it stoop’d to drink;
Or with the ramping colt, all joyous play’d,
Or scared the owlet in the blue-ball shade.
(Ebenezer Elliott)
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Based on Topics: Man Poems, Mind Poems, Youth Poems, Fairness Poems, Friendship Poems, Flowers Poems, Home Poems, Smiling Poems, Truth Poems, Summer Poems, Garden PoemsBased on Keywords: urchins, heart-breaking, purloin, youngling, ramping, owlet, footpath, fledged, townsman, hedger, understand-