s great heart with loving force
Throbs throughout the universe;
We are His and He is just;
Hope and trust.

O LET ME DREAM THE DREAMS OF LONG AGO

Call me not back, O cold and crafty world:
I scorn your thankless thanks and hollow praise.
Wiser than seer or scientist--content
To tread no paths beyond these bleating hills,
Here let me lie beneath this dear old elm,
Among the blossoms of the clover-fields,
And listen to the humming of the bees.
Here in those far-off, happy, boyhood years,
When all my world was bounded by these hills,
I dreamed my first dreams underneath this elm.
Dreamed? Aye, and builded castles in the clouds;
Dreamed, and made glad a fond, proud mother's heart,
Now moldering into clay on yonder hill;
Dreamed till my day-dreams paved the world with gold;
Dreamed till my mad dreams made one desolate;
Dreamed--O my soul, and was it all a dream?

As I lay dreaming under this old elm,
Building my castles in the sunny clouds,
Her soft eyes peeping from the copse of pine,
Looked tenderly on me and my glad heart leaped
Following her footsteps. O the dream--the dream!
O fawn-eyed, lotus-lipped, white-bosomed Flore!
I hide my bronzed face in your golden hair:
Thou wilt not heed the dew-drops on my beard;
Thou wilt not heed the wrinkles on my brow;
Thou wilt not chide me for my long delay.

Here we stood heart to heart and eye to eye,
And I looked down into her inmost soul,
The while she drank my promise like sweet wine
O let me dream the dreams of long ago!
Soft are the tender eyes of maiden love;
Sweet are the dew-drops of a dear girl's lips
When love's red roses blush in sudden bloom:
O let me dream the dreams of long ago!
Hum soft and low, O bee-bent clover-fields;
Blink, blue-eyed violets, from the dewy grass;
Break into bloom, my golden dandelions;
Break into bloom, my dear old apple-trees.
I hear the robins cherup on the hedge,
I hear the warbling of the meadow-larks;
I hear the silver-fluted whippowil;
I hear the harps that moan among the pines
Touched by the ghostly fingers of the dead.
Hush!--let me dream the dreams of long ago.

And wherefore left I these fair, flowery fields,
Where her fond eyes and ever gladsome voice
Made all the year one joyous, warbling June,
To chase my castles in the passing clouds--
False as the mirage of some Indian isle
To shipwrecked sailors famished on the brine?
Wherefore?--Look out upon the babbling world--
Fools clamoring at the heels o