The Silence Of The Bush

There’s that in our lone Bush, I know not what, Which ’genders silence; I’ve all that to learn. Here, there and everywhere, to loose the knot That binds the sheaf-band of the taciturn; It may be where it freezes; where ’tis hot, Or streams lie silent in the nymph’s cool urn; In forest depths, or where the lone plain stretches Sans other roof than sky, o’er heat-worn wretches. Or ’mid the gully’s fern and sassafras, Where all is cool green glooms and early dusk, With silvern foliage in delicious mass As, sunwards, feel their way the spires of musk; Or where those solemn branches crossing, pass And wave o’er-head their pennon’d fragrant husk; Or by the river’s marge or broad gumbower With lily-pads a-swim and floating flower. Here might one read the Silence of Fatigue, And here again of Rest and Admiration. Where gentle hands are clasped in wordless league, And eyes meet eyes in eloquent oration, Or fingers wreathed, accomplish mute intrigue, Or tell by signs of ardent adoration, Or past all these, ’neath burning rocks and bare, The deep and death-like Silence of Despair.