Peaceful our valley, fair and green,
⁠And beautiful her cottages,
Each in its nook, its sheltered hold,
⁠Or underneath its tuft of trees.

Many and beautiful they are;
⁠But there is one that I love best,
A lowly shed in truth it is,
⁠A brother of the rest.

Yet when I sit on rock or hill
⁠Down-looking on the valley fair,
That cottage with its clustering trees
⁠Summons my heart; it settles there.

Others there are whose small domain
⁠Of fertile fields and hedgerows green
Might more seduce a wanderer's mind
⁠To wish that there his home had been.

Such wish be his! I blame him not;
⁠My fancies they perchance are wild,
I love that house because it is
⁠The very mountains' child.

Fields hath it of its own green fields,
⁠But they are craggy, steep and bare,
Their fence is of the mountain stone,
⁠And moss and lichen flourish there.

And when the storm comes from the north
⁠It lingers near that pastoral spot,
And, piping through the mossy walls,
⁠It seems delighted with its lot.

And let it take its own delight,
⁠And let it range the pastures bare,
Until it reach that nest of trees,—
⁠It may not enter there!

A green unfading grove it is,
⁠Skirted with many a lesser tree —
Hazel and holly, beech and oak,
⁠A bright and flourishing company!

Precious the shelter of those trees!
⁠They screen the cottage that I love,
The sunshine pierces to the roof,
⁠And the tall pine-trees tower above.

Coming along by the meadows,
⁠Just after the sun went down,
Watching the gathering shadows
⁠Creep over the hillsides brown;

Coming along in the gloaming,
⁠With never a star in the sky,
My thoughts went a-roaming, a-roaming
⁠Through days that are long gone by;

Days when desire said, "To-morrow,
⁠To-morrow, heart, we'll be gay!"
Days ere the heart heard the sorrow
⁠Which echoes through yesterday.

Life was a goblet burnished,
⁠That with love for wine was filled;
The cup is bruised and tarnished,
⁠And the precious wine is spilled,

But to the traveller weary,
⁠Just coming in sight of home,
What does it matter how dreary
⁠The way whereby he has come?

Coming along by the meadows,
⁠And watching the fading day,
Duskier than night's dusky shadows
⁠Fell shadows of yesterday.

In the northern sunset's glimmer,
⁠The Great Bear opened his eyes;
Low in the east a shimmer
⁠Showed where the full moon would rise.

Lights in a window were gleaming,
⁠And some one stood at a gate,
Said, "Why do you stand there dreaming?
⁠And why are you home so late?"

Yesterday's shadow and sorrow
⁠That moment all vanished away!
Here were to-day and to-morrow —
⁠What matter for yesterday?

Prayer is balsam, comfort, peace,
⁠The loss of self in Deity;
The harmony of human souls
⁠With heaven's eternal melody!

Prayer is freedom, loss of all
⁠That binds the soul to this poor clod;
So that no words, nor forms, nor thoughts
⁠Stand darkening between her and God!

Mysterious, and yet so bright,
⁠It bears the soul to heaven away;
'Tis like a slumbering at the source,
⁠And yet a waking into day.