JUNE
by: William Cullen Bryant
(1794-1878)
- GAZED upon
the glorious sky
- And the green mountains round,
- And thought that when I came to lie
- At rest within the ground,
- 'T were pleasant, that in flowery June,
- When brooks send up a cheerful tune,
- And groves a joyous sound,
- The sexton's hand, my grave to make,
- The rich, green mountain-turf should break.
-
- A cell within the frozen mould,
- A coffin borne through sleet,
- And icy clods above it rolled,
- While fierce the tempests beat--
- Away!--I will not think of these--
- Blue be the sky and soft the breeze,
- Earth green beneath the feet,
- And be the damp mould gently pressed
- Into my narrow place of rest.
-
- There through the long, long summer hours
- The golden light should lie,
- And thick young herbs and groups of flowers
- Stand in their beauty by.
- The oriole should build and tell
- His love-tale close beside my cell;
- The idle butterfly
- Should rest him there, and there be heard
- The housewife bee and humming-bird.
-
- And what if cheerful shouts at noon
- Come, from the village sent,
- Or song of maids, beneath the moon
- With fairy laughter blent?
- And what if, in the evening light,
- Betrothèd lovers walk in sight
- Of my low monument?
- I would the lovely scene around
- Might know no sadder sight nor sound.
-
- I know that I no more should see
- The season's glorious show,
- Nor would its brightness shine for me,
- Nor its wild music flow;
- But if, around my place of sleep,
- The friends I love should come to weep,
- They might not haste to go.
- Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom
- Should keep them lingering by my tomb.
-
- These to their softened hearts should bear
- The thought of what has been,
- And speak of one who cannot share
- The gladness of the scene;
- Whose part, in all the pomp that fills
- The circuit of the summer hills,
- Is that his grave is green;
- And deeply would their hearts rejoice
- To hear again his living voice.
"June" is reprinted from
Yale Book of American Verse. Ed. Thomas R. Lounsbury.
New Haven: Yale University Press, 1912. |
MORE POEMS BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT |
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