The Talking

Oak

And in a fit of frolic mirthod wod nÃ3 She strove to span my waist:id#W Alas, I was so broad of girth,odtom 18H

I could not be embraced. or bunds&

"I wish'd myself the fair young beechfi
That here beside me stands, no ha2.
That round me, clasping each in each,
She might have lock'd her hands.da

'Yet seem'd the pressure thrice as sweet› As woodbine's fragile hold,add og J Or when I feel about my feet

The berried briony fold.'

O muffle round thy knees with fern,

And shadow Sumner-chace!vil baA
Long may thy topmost branch discern
The roofs of Sumner place!orited

But tell me, did she read the name ⠀ A.
I carved with many vows

When last with throbbing heart I came A
To rest beneath thy boughs?

odA

10 yes, she wander'd round and round
These knotted knees of mine,
And found, and kiss'd the name she found,
And sweetly murmur'd thine. bak

A teardrop trembled from its source,
And down my surface crept.ca bars
My sense of touch is something coarse,
But I believe she wept.

Then flush'd her cheek with rosy light,

She glanced across the plain;

But not à creature was in sight:
She kiss'd me once again.

Her kisses were so close and kind, og 6
That, trust me on my word,ve
Hard wood I am, and wrinkled rind,
But yet my sap was stirr'd:

•And even into my inmost ring
A pleasure I discern'd,

Like those blind motions of the Spring,
That show the year is turn'd. baA

Thrice-happy he that may caress
The ringlet's waving balm

The cushions of whose touch may press

The maiden's tender palm.

I, rooted here among the groves,

But languidly adjust

My vapid vegetable loves

bu

With anthers and with dust:

For ah! the Dryad-days were brief
Whereof the poets talk,

A

When that, which breathes within the leaf,
Could slip its bark and walk.

But could I, as in times foregone,amo? From spray, and branch, and stem, Have suck'd and gather'd into onese The life that spreads in them, **J

The Talking Oak

The Talking Oak

'She had not found me so remiss ;
But lightly issuing thro',

I would have paid her kiss for kiss, o qua
With usury thereto.'

O flourish high, with leafy towers,
And overlook the lea, un

Pursue thy loves among the bowers brushl
But leave thou mine to me.a Jag biể

O flourish, hidden deep in fern,
Old oak, I love thee well;
A thousand thanks for what I learn
And what remains to tell.wonde

'Tis little more: the day was warm;
At last, tired out with play,
She sank her head upon her arm,
And at my feet she lay.

Her eyelids dropp'd their silken eaves.
I breathed upon her eyes
Thro' all the summer of my leaves

A welcome mix'd with sighs.

'I took the swarming sound of life

The music from the town—

The murmurs of the drum and fife now!!

And lull'd them in my own.

• Sometimes I let a sunbeam slip,
To light her shaded eye;
A second flutter'd round her lip
Like a golden butterfly ;

'A third would glimmer on her neck To make the necklace shine

Another slid, a sunny fleck,

;

From head to ancle fine. lggad smod

'Then close and dark my arms I spread,
And shadow'd all her rest
Dropt dews upon her golden head,
An acorn in her breast.

"O kiss him twice and thrice for me,

That have no lips to kiss,

For never yet was oak on lea

Shall grow so fair as this.'

Step deeper yet in herb and fern,

Look further thro' the chace, Spread upward till thy boughs discern The front of Sumner-place.

The Talking Oak

This fruit of thine by Love is blest
That but a moment lay mla e
Where fairer fruit of Love may rest
Some happy future day, brod mm A

I kiss It
twice, I kiss it thrice, ob nodT
The warmth it thence shall win bab
To riper life may magnetise
The baby-oak within.

But thou, while kingdoms overset,ni muff
Or lapse from hand to hand,

Thy leaf shall never fail, nor yetball qM
Thine acorn in the land.d push bak.

May never saw dismember thee, ay bah?
Nor wielded axe disjoint,

That art the fairest-spoken tree
From here to Lizard-point.

O rock upon thy towery-topdorida I
All throats that gurgle sweet!
All starry culmination drop

Balm-dews to bathe thy feet!

SAT

All grass of silky feather grow all O he sinks or swells

And while he

The full south-breeze around thee blow
The sound of minster bells.

The fat earth feed thy branchy root,
That under deeply strikes!

The northern morning o'er thee shoot,
High up, in silver spikes!