Poems of Nature
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~12,200 words · 58 passages
Cite this work
- APAHenry David Thoreau. (n.d.). Poems of Nature. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/thoreau/poems-of-nature
- MLAHenry David Thoreau. Poems of Nature. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/thoreau/poems-of-nature.
- ChicagoHenry David Thoreau. Poems of Nature. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/thoreau/poems-of-nature.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
Poems of Nature (1895): the poetry, collected thirty years after his death.
Context and history
Thoreau thought of himself as a poet before a prose writer, and Emerson told him to give it up. He was half right: the poems do not stand beside Walden, but they explain how he learned to write the sentences that do.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
It is a spirit, not a blood relation, Superior to family and station. TO THE MAIDEN IN THE EAST Low in the eastern sky Is set thy glancing eye; And though its gracious light Ne’er riseth to my sight, Yet every star that climbs Above the gnarlèd limbs Of yonder hill, Conveys thy gentle will. Believe I knew thy thought, And that the zephyrs brought Thy kindest wishes through, As mine they bear to you; That some attentive cloud Did pause amid the crowd Over my head, While gentle things were said. Believe the thrushes sung, And that the flower-bells rung, That herbs exhaled their scent, And beasts knew what was meant, The trees a welcome waved, And lakes their margins laved, When thy free mind To my retreat did wind. It was a summer eve, The air did gently heave While yet a low-hung cloud Thy eastern skies did shroud; The lightning’s silent gleam, Startling my drowsy dream, Seemed like the flash Under thy dark eyelash. From yonder comes the sun, But soon his course is run, Rising to trivial day Along his dusty way; But thy noontide completes Only auroral heats, Nor ever sets, To hasten vain regrets. Direct thy pensive eye Into the western sky; And when the evening star Does glimmer from afar Upon the mountain line, Accept it for a sign That I am near, And thinking of thee here. I’ll be thy Mercury, Thou Cytherea to me, Distinguished by thy face The earth shall learn my place; As near beneath thy light Will I outwear the night, With mingled ray Leading the westward way.…
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