The Home Coming

FROM the trees the wind is stripping
Yellow leaflets dank and dripping,
And the daffodil-sunset tipping
All the hills with misty light j
Where the fitful gleam has rested,
Waves, a moment amber-crested,
Now with deeper gloom invested,
Groan, impatient for the night.

Dusk enfolded, shadow-holden,
Mossy barn and wheat-rick golden,
Granary grey and farmstead olden,
Swathed in restful drowsing lie.
Gulls cry down the shore, — and over
Flooded fields the wailing plover
Strays, and lonely curlews hover
Black against the fading sky.

But while darkness nearer closes,
And the hamlet hushed reposes, —
Summer wakens all its roses
Forth to blossom in my heart,
When with rapturous joy completest
In another moment fleetest
I shall greet you, O my sweetest,
Held so long from me apart.

Every wave expectant glistens,
Every leaf on tiptoe listens,
Strange sounds wander in the distance
O'er the stubble-fields new ploughed ;
All the starry lamps are burning,
Lit to welcome your returning,
And the moon, my bliss discerning,
Springs from out a sable cloud.

Blow, keen wind, from off the hilly
Woodlands damp and pastures chilly,
But around my love, my lily,
Breathe more languid and more low ;
Sweet world-old love-legends sing her,
Delicate corn-odours bring her,
Faint warm fragrances that linger
Where the latest violets grow.

Milk-white moon, through cloud-wrack hoary,
Pour in pearly streams thy glory,
Stoop thy horn to hear our story,
Droop thy curve to kiss my dear.
Wreathe her round with glimmerings tender,
Crown her brows with mystic splendour,
With thine influence pure befriend her,
Steadfast through the waning year.

Comes she not? the darkness thickens, —
All my soul with longing sickens,
All my heart its beating quickens,
To a joy-march wild and fast.
O to mark her fleet feet nearing,
O to find, at her appearing,
Light and night, and sight and hearing,
Swallowed up in joy at last I