The Rivulet

This little rill that, from the springsOf yonder grove, its current brings,Plays on the slope awhile, and thenGoes prattling into groves again,Oft to its warbling waters drewMy little feet, when life was new.When woods in early green were drest,And from the chambers of the westThe warmer breezes, travelling out,Breathed the new scent of flowers about,My truant steps from home would stray,Upon its grassy side to play,List the brown thrasher's vernal hymn,And crop the violet on its brim,With blooming cheek and open brow,As young and gay, sweet rill, as thou.

And when the days of boyhood came,And I had grown in love with fame,Duly I sought thy banks, and triedMy first rude numbers by thy side.Words cannot tell how bright and gayThe scenes of life before me lay.Then glorious hopes, that now to speakWould bring the blood into my cheek,Passed o’er me; and I wrote, on high,A name I deemed should never die.

Years change thee not. Upon yon hillThe tall old maples, verdant still,Yet tell, in grandeur of decay,How swift the years have passed away,Since first, a child, and half afraid,I wandered in the forest shade.Thou, ever-joyous rivulet,Dost dimple, leap, and prattle yet;And sporting with the sands that paveThe windings of thy silver wave,And dancing to thy own wild chime,Thou laughest at the lapse of time.The same sweet sounds are in my earMy early childhood loved to hear;As pure thy limpid waters run;As bright they sparkle to the sun;As fresh and thick the bending ranksOf herbs that line thy oozy banks;The violet there, in soft May dew,Comes up, as modest and as blue;As green amid thy current’s stress,Floats the scarce-rooted watercress;And the brown ground-bird, in thy glen,Still chirps as merrily as then.

Thou changest not—but I am changedSince first thy pleasant banks I ranged;And the grave stranger, come to seeThe play-place of his infancy,Has scarce a single trace of himWho sported once upon thy brim.The visions of my youth are pastToo bright, too beautiful to last.I’ve tried the world—it wears no moreThe coloring of romance it wore.Yet well has Nature kept the truthShe promised in my earliest youth.The radiant beauty shed abroadOn all the glorious works of God,Shows freshly, to my sobered eye,Each charm it wore in days gone by.

A few brief years shall pass away,And I, all trembling, weak, and gray,Bowed to the earth, which waits to foldMy ashes in the embracing mould,(If haply the dark will of FateIndulge my life so long a date),May come for the last time to lookUpon my childhood’s favorite brook.Then dimly on my eye shall gleamThe sparkle of thy dancing stream;And faintly on my ear shall fallThy prattling current’s merry call;Yet shalt thou flow as glad and brightAs when thou met'st my infant sight.

And I shall sleep—and on thy side,As ages after ages glide,Children their early sports shall try,And pass to hoary age and die.But thou, unchanged from year to year,Gayly shalt play and glitter here;Amid young flowers and tender grassThy endless infancy shall pass;And, singing down thy narrow glen,Shalt mock the fading race of men.