GREEN BOUGHS OF HOME.

GREEN boughs of home, that come between
Mine eyes and this far distant scene,
I see, whene’er my thought escapes,
Your old serene familiar shapes;

Each lissom willow tree that dips

Into the stream her golden whips,
The sassafras beside the gate,
Where twilight strollers linger late;

The hemlock groups that dimly hold
Their own against the noonday gold,

The maple lines that give the view
A green or luminous avenue;

Those oldest apple trees whose forms
Have braved a hundred years of storms,
And turn a face as blithe and free

To greet their second century; [Page 128]

The younger orchard’s heavy edge,
Framed in the honey locust hedge;
Fruit-flushed, snow-burdened or bloom-bright,
It comes to my home-longing sight;

The billowy woods across the road,
Where all the winds of heaven strode,
And sang in every towering stem,
Would that I were at home with them!

For under these down-bending boughs

A thousand tender memories house.
Oh, while your old companions roam,
Your peace be theirs, green boughs of home! [Page 129]