To a Butterfly. STAY near me-do not take thy flight; Much converse do I find in thee, Historian of my infancy! Float near me; do not yet depart Dead times revive in thee: Thou bring'st, gay creature as thou art, Oh, pleasant, pleasant were the days, Upon the prey; with leaps and springs The dust from off its wings. The Solitary Reaper. BEHOLD her, single in the field, No nightingale did ever chant More welcome notes to weary bands Of travellers in some shady haunt Among Arabian sands; A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard In spring-time from the cuckoo-bird, Breaking the silence of the seas, Among the farthest Hebrides. Will no one tell me what she sings? Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow For old, unhappy, far-off things, And battles long ago. Or is it some more humble lay, Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain, That hath been and may be again? Six feet in earth my Emma lay; I e'er had loved before. And, turning from her grave, I met, Beside the churchyard-yew, A blooming girl, whose hair was wet With points of morning dew. A basket on her head she bare; Her brow was smooth and white: To see a child so very fair, It was a pure delight! No fountain from its rocky cave There came from me a sigh of pain, I looked at her, and looked again,— And did not wish her mine!" Matthew is in his grave; yet now, As at that moment, with a bough |