The bright-hair’d morn is glowing

O’er emerald meadows gay,

With many a clear gem strewing

The early shepherd’s way.

Ye gentle elves, by Fancy seen

Stealing away with night

To slumber in your leafy screen,

Tread more than airy light.

And see what joyous greeting

The sun through heaven has shed,

Though fast yon shower be fleeting,

His beams have faster sped.

For lo! above the western haze

High towers the rainbow arch

In solid span of purest rays:

How stately is its march!

Pride of the dewy morning!

The swain’s experienc’d eye

From thee takes timely warning,

Nor trusts the gorgeous sky.

For well he knows, such dawnings gay

Bring noons of storm and shower,

And travellers linger on the way

Beside the sheltering bower.

E’en so, in hope and trembling

Should watchful shepherd view

His little lambs assembling,

With glance both kind and true;

’Tis not the eye of keenest blaze,

Nor the quick-swelling breast,

That soonest thrills at touch of praise —

These do not please him best.

But voices low and gentle,

And timid glances shy,

That seem for aid parental

To sue all wistfully,

Still pressing, longing to be right,

Yet fearing to be wrong, —

In these the Pastor dares delight,

A lamb-like, Christ-like throng.

These in Life’s distant even

Shall shine serenely bright,

As in th’ autumnal heaven

Mild rainbow tints at night,

When the last shower is stealing down,

And ere they sink to rest,

The sun-beams weave a parting crown

For some sweet woodland nest.

The promise of the morrow

Is glorious on that eve,

Dear as the holy sorrow

When good men cease to live.

When brightening ere it die away

Mounts up their altar flame,

Still tending with intenser ray

To Heaven whence first it came.

Say not it dies, that glory,

’Tis caught unquench’d on high,

Those saintlike brows so hoary

Shall wear it in the sky.

No smile is like the smile of death,

When all good musings past

Rise wafted with the parting breath,

The sweetest thought the last.