As on the plain shoot up the wheatstalks
So do the thoughts in the spirit of man
Grow up and waver;
But the gentle thoughts of the poet
Are as the red and blue-colour’d flowers
Merrily blooming between them.
Red and blue-colour’d flowers!
The surly reaper rejects you as useless,
Wooden flails all-scornfully thresh you,
Even the needy traveller,
Whom your sight rejoices and quickens,
Shaketh his head,
And calleth you pretty weeds;
But the rustic virgin,
The twiner of garlands,
Doth honour and pluck you,
And with you decketh her beauteous locks,
And thus adorn’d, makes haste to the dance,
Where pipes and fiddles sweetly are sounding,
Or to the silent beech-tree,
Where the voice of the loved one still sweeter doth sound
Than pipes or than fiddles.