Twenty-Third Sunday After Trinity
Red o'er the forest peers the setting sun,
The line of yellow light dies fast away
That crowned the eastern copse: and chill and dun
Falls on the moor the brief November day.
Now the tired hunter winds a parting note,
And Echo hide good-night from every glade;
Yet wait awhile, and see the calm heaves float
Each to his rest beneath their parent shade.
How like decaying life they seem to glide!
And yet no second spring have they in store,
But where they fall, forgotten to abide
Is all their portion, and they ask no more.
Soon o'er their heads blithe April airs shall sing,
A thousand wild-flowers round them shall unfold,
The green buds glisten in the dews of Spring,
And all be vernal rapture as of old.
Unconscious they in waste oblivion lie,
In all the world of busy life around
No thought of them; in all the bounteous sky,
No drop, for them, of kindly influence found.
Man's portion is to die and rise again -
Yet he complains, while these unmurmuring part
With their sweet lives, as pure from sin and stain,
As his when Eden held his virgin heart.
And haply half unblamed his murmuring voice
Might sound in Heaven, were all his second life
Only the first renewed--the heathen's choice,
A round of listless joy and weary strife.
For dreary were this earth, if earth were all,
Tho' brightened oft by dear Affection's kiss; -
Who for the spangles wears the funeral pall?
But catch a gleam beyond it, and 'tis bliss.
Heavy and dull this frame of limbs and heart,
Whether slow creeping on cold earth, or borne
On lofty steed, or loftier prow, we dart
O'er wave or field: yet breezes laugh to scorn
Our puny speed, and birds, and clouds in heaven,
And fish, living shafts that pierce the main,
And stars that shoot through freezing air at even -
Who but would follow, might he break his chain?
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poem by John Keble
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