Pike County Ballads and Other Poems

THE PRAIRIE.

  The skies are blue above my head,
    The prairie green below,
  And flickering o'er the tufted grass
    The shifting shadows go,
  Vague-sailing, where the feathery clouds
    Fleck white the tranquil skies,
  Black javelins darting where aloft
    The whirring pheasant flies.

  A glimmering plain in drowsy trance
    The dim horizon bounds,
  Where all the air is resonant
    With sleepy summer sounds,—
  The life that sings among the flowers,
    The lisping of the breeze,
  The hot cicala's sultry cry,
    The murmurous dream of bees.

  The butterfly—a flying flower—
    Wheels swift in flashing rings,
  And flutters round his quiet kin,
    With brave flame-mottled wings.
  The wild Pinks burst in crimson fire
    The Phlox' bright clusters shine,
  And Prairie-Cups are swinging free
    To spill their airy wine.

  And lavishly beneath the sun,
    In liberal splendour rolled,
  The Fennel fills the dipping plain
    With floods of flowery gold;
  And widely weaves the Iron-Weed
    A woof of purple dyes
  Where Autumn's royal feet may tread
    When bankrupt Summer flies.

  In verdurous tumult far away
    The prairie-billows gleam,
  Upon their crests in blessing rests
    The noontide's gracious beam.
  Low quivering vapours steaming dim
    The level splendours break
  Where languid Lilies deck the rim
    Of some land-circled lake.

  Far in the east like low-hung clouds
    The waving woodlands lie;
  Far in the west the glowing plain
    Melts warmly in the sky.
  No accent wounds the reverent air,
    No footprint dints the sod,
  Lone in the light the prairie lies
    Rapt in a dream of God.

  ILLINOIS, 1858.