John Bradford: Verses about Joy

Come away, gentle Clare, to the banks of the Wye,
While the stars of the earth shine to gladden thine eye,
And the sward of the dell by the hazel-wood grove
Is a carpet most meet for thy light feet to rove ;
While the echoes repeat the wild bird's gushing song ;
While the bright babbling brook goes careering along ;
And all things are so fair no delights can outvie
The delights that abound on the banks of the Wye.

On Maplecliffe's top there's a wide-spreading yew.
From beneath whose dark boughs the glad eye gains a view
Of a prospect so grand thy pure heart can but praise,
As away o'er its beauties thy bright blue eyes gaze ;
For the smooth-gliding river, the oak, elm, and pine.
Will enrapture a soul so susceptive as thine ;
Then bid the gay city's allurements good bye,
And repair to the beautiful banks of the Wye.

Drawn fresh from the founts of perennial joy.
The delights of thy mind shall be free from alloy ;
For in cool, quiet glades, where the leafy boughs wave.
We'll peruse the wise words of the learned and grave ;
And, as gaily we roam the bright valleys along,
Eehearse the sweet strains of the Children of Song,
Then bid the gay city's allurements good bye,
And repair to the beautiful banks of the Wye.

The sage's rich lore and the poet's sweet lay,
The fields gaily dight in their choicest array ;
The musical brook and the leaf-vestur'd tree,
Are ready to yield their enjoyments to thee,
For delights such as these that thine advent await
A Queen might abandon her splendour and state.
Then bid the gay city's allurements good bye,
And repair to the beautiful banks of the Wye.

FROM sunny climes, beyond the main,
Come, potent Spring,
On rapid wing,
And glorify our isle again.

Banish the cold, ungenial snow.
From the high hills ;
Unbind the rills.
And in fair freedom let them flow

Through valleys lone and dingles wild ;
Where, as they pass,
They'll joy to glass
Bright blooms by no lude touch defil'd.

Cause me again, benignant Spring,
To pause and mark
The loud-voic'd lark,
While with his lays the valleys ring.

As high he soars, on pinions fleet,
0'er many a field
That soon will yield
Rich stores of barley, beans, and wheat.

The butterfly, on wing rich-hu'd,
Send forth again
O'er hill and plain
By urchin foemen unpursu'd ;

While the green robes of all the meads
Of daisies white
And kingcups bright
Profusely bear the beauteous beads.

Star deftly with anemones
The copses' moss ;
Let harebells toss
Their azure heads in every hreeze ;

While the shy cushat's mellow coo,
From far and near,
Falls on the ear,
Filling the heart with gladness true.

Let with the gorse's golden light
The commons flame,
And proudly claim
Meet notice from each passer's sight ;

While from the trees that round them stand.
The speckled thrush,
Gush after gush,
Pours forth his music sweetly bland.

Distilments rich of honey sweet
Let the wild bee
Delighted see
When it alights, with tiny feet.

On clover boss, pink, sweet and soft,
On orchis frail.
On primrose pale,
Or soars to chesnat cones aloft.

Let bush and tree rich raiment seek
From thy apt loom ;
Bring back the bloom
To many a patient's pain-pal'd cheek ;

And glad the heart of sinless childhood
With mirth and joy,
Free from alloy—
Found fairly so in glen and wildwood.

Quick use, sweet Spring, thy powers divine,
And loftier lays
Thy deeds shall praise
Then e'er can flow from pen of mine.

OH ! deem me not cruel, bright, many-hu'd flowers,
That I bear you away from the meads and the bowers,
Where the butterfly might on your petals alight.
And the breeze gather perfume to shed in its flight ;
For T bear you away, in your beauty and bloom.
To cheer and enliven the solemn sick room
Of one who still lo\res, with a love deep and true.
Your hues, odours, and foims, and the spots where you grew.

He will gaze on your beauties witli pleasure and pride.
As you stand in a vase by his quiet bedside.
And he'll talk of the days when, fleet-footed and strong.
Through the woods and the meads he went rambling along,
As delighted and gay, and as free from all care.
As the fawns of the park or the birds of the air ;
And, when sleep for awhile softly steals o'er his brain.
In his dreams he will tread all his old haunts again.

He will wander away through the green winding lanes.
Where the bright golden gorse in its gay glory reigns ;
Where the rays of the starwort are fair to the sight,
And the speedwell discloses its eyelets of white ;
Where the brown linnet sits on the hedgerow's frail spray,
And elatedly carols his tenderest lay ;
While above, in the blooms of the old chestnut trees,
Sounds the satisfied hum of the amber-zon'd bees.

He will wander along by the bright streamlet's side,
Where the murmuring waves by the sweet hawthorns glide ;
Where the tall, graceful crane's-bill displays its fair head.
And the cardamine's petals wide open are spread ;
While the sooty-wing'd merle, darting off in affright.
Shakes a shower of white blooms o'er its surface most bright.
While swiftly away the suspicious trout glide
In their deepest retreats from the gazer to hide.

When the sun brightly shines in the sky overhead.
The soft, emerald turf of the meads he will tread ;
Where the cowslip erects its pale fairly-fleck'd bells.
While beside it the orchis in calm beauty dwells ;
Where the crowfoot displays its bright beakers of gold.
And the daisies their purple-tipp'd petals unfold ;
While borne up aloft, on his pinions so strong,
The rosset-rob'd skylark emits his glad song.

Through the woods and the glades his glad way he will wend
Where the strawberries creep and the bright blue-bells bend ;
Where their sweet-smelling blossoms the violets show,
And the primroses pale still in large clusters grow ;
While distant and near, in the trees all around.
The enrapturing lays of the happy birds sound.
And the lapse of the musical streamlet anear.
Is a fount of delight to the listener's ear.

Then deem me not cruel, bright many hu'd flowers !
That I bear you away from the meads and the bowers.
Where the butterfly might on your petals alight ;
And the breeze gather perfume to shed in its flight ;
For I bear you away, in your beauty and bloom,
To cheer and enliven the solemn sick room
Of one who still loves, with a love deep and true.
Your hues, odours, and forms, and the spots where you grew.

THE QUESTION.

DEAR to the bright cerulean sky
Unstirr'd the silvery cloudlets lie ;
O'er yonder wide, unruffl'd bay
The white-sail'd ships can make no way;
No rustling from the sedges near
Falls on the loitering listener's ear ;
From the old cottage in the croft
Straightly ascends the smoke aloft ;
The spreading oak, the silver birch.
The yew beside the village church,
And the tall pine upon the hill.
Are all at rest—serenely still ;
No zephyrs o'er the meadows pass
With balmy breath to fan the grass,
Or raise a ripple on the river ;
Why, aspen, then, dost thou still quiver?

THE ANSWER.

O'er eighteen hundred years ago,
Where Jordan's amber waters flow,
Green, graceful, calm, and fair to view,
My ruthless old forefathers grew ;
But, on a morn of spring-tide bright.
When, from the blue unclouded sky,
The sun shone down with dazzling light.
Inviting flowers of varied dye
Their fragile petals to unfold.
And glad the bees that rov'd the plains,
Filling the birds with joy untold,
The air with their melodious strains ;
Wiling the adder from its lair,
And making all Creation's face,
From high hill's top to rough rock's base,
Bright, peaceful, smiling, calm, and fair ;
Up Jordan's vale an angel flew,
Array'd in robes of lily hue,
Exclaiming, as she wing'd her way.
In accents fraught with dire dismay :—
' Weep, flocks and herds ;
Weep, beasts and birds ;
Weep, flowers and trees ;
Weep, adders and bees ;
Weep, insects small ;
Weep, creatures all ;
And let the joys you hold most dear
Give place to wonder, woe, and fear ;
For now, with insult, blow, and curse,
The God of all the Universe
By ruthless men, with impious zest,
Is being led
His blood to shed
On Calvary's gore-encrimson'd crest.'
Soon as these words of woe were said,
The flocks and herds no longer fed ;
The coney sought the loneliest dell ;
The bee forsook the floret's bell ;
The adder sought its lair again ;
No wild bird's song swept o'er the plain ;
No insect hummed its tiny strain ;
The flowers, rich in scent and hue,
Their beauties from the gaze withdrew ;
And every shrub and tree that grew,
Excepting my forefathers proud,
In fear and awe their branches bow'd ;
But they, on selfish joys intent,
With every breeze that through them went.
Still sported on without a pause ;
And in the waves that by them passed
With guilty pride their beauty glass'd.
As if of grief they had no cause.
But soon the sun its beams withdrew,
And such a gloom o'er earth was thrown,
As until then had ne'er been known—
Veiling all things around from view.
And while the lightning lit the air
With lurid and appalling glare ;
While the loud thunder, peal on peal,
Made the old hills' foundations reel ;
While the strong earthquake's mighty shocks
Asunder rent the hoary rocks ;
And those who in their graves had lain
Were seen to tread the earth again ;
In sap and fibre, bough and spray.
They felt a thrill of fear and pain ;
And when the darkness cleared away,
And Nature's face grew fair again.
The victims of remorse and grief
They trembling stood in every leaf ;
And since that day of anguish deep,
Not for the space of one brief hour
Have their descendants had the power
A single leaf at rest to keep ;
And thus, until the end of time,
They'll mourn for their forefathers' crime.