In many hollows that the walled rocks heap:

The lairs of Pan; and, lo, in murmuring places,
In bushy clefts, what woodland Nymphs arouse!
Where, full of yearning for the azure spaces,
Tree, crowding tree, lifts high its heavy boughs.

Old forests, where the gnarly oak stands regnant
Bristling with twigs that still repullulate,
And, swoln with spring, with sappy sweetness pregnant,
The maple blushes with its leafy weight.

And, mother-like, in cirques of quiet shadows,
Milk flows, warm milk, that keeps all things alive;
Fruit is not far, th' abundance of the meadows,
And honey oozes from the hollow hive.




_Lines_


Within the world of every man's desire
Three things have power to lift his soul above,
Through dreams, religion, and ecstatic fire,
The star-like shapes of Beauty, Truth, and Love.

I never hoped that, this side far-off Heaven,
These three,--whom all exalted souls pursue,--