The poem
I
How warm this woodland wild Recess ! Love surely hath been breathing here ; And this sweet bed of heath, my dear ! Swells up, then sinks with faint caress, As if to have you yet more near.
II
Eight springs have flown, since last I lay On sea-ward Quantock's heathy hills, Where quiet sounds from hidden rills Float hear and there, like things astray, And high o'er head the sky-lark shrills.
III
No voice as yet had made the air Be music with your name ; yet why That asking look ? that yearning sigh ? That sense of promise every where ? Belovéd ! flew your spirit by ?
IV
As when a mother doth explore The rose-mark on her long-lost child, I met, I loved you, maiden mild ! As whom I long had loved before-- So deeply had I been beguiled.
V
You stood before me like a thought, A dream remembered in a dream. But when those meek eyes first did seem To tell me, Love within you wrought-- O Greta, dear domestic stream !
VI
Has not, since then, Love's prompture deep, Has not Love's whisper evermore Been ceaseless, as thy gentle roar ? Sole voice, when other voices sleep, Dear under-song in clamor's hour.