Out of the city, far away
With spring to-day! —
Where copses tufted with primrose
Give me repose,
Wood-sorrel and wild violet
Soothe my soul's fret,
The pure delicious vernal air
Blows away care,
The birds' reiterated songs
Heal fancied wrongs.
Down the rejoicing brook my grief
Drifts like a leaf,
And on its gently murmuring flow
Cares glide and go;
The bud-besprinkled boughs and hedges,
The sprouting sedges
Waving beside the water's brink,
Come like cool drink
To fever'd lips, like fresh soft mead
To kine that feed.
Much happier than the kine, I bed
My dreaming head
In grass; I see far mountains blue,
Like heav'n in view,
Green world and sunny sky above
Alive with love;
All, all, however came they there,
Divinely fair.
Is this the better oracle,
Or what streets tell?
O base confusion, falsehood, strife,
Man puts in life!
Sink, thou life-measurer! — I can say
"I've lived a day;"
And memory holds it now in keeping,
Awake or sleeping.