Blair Collection > Selections from the Gaelic bards

256 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
And then I watched them as they fluttered,
Quivering, quivering high in air,
While its own soft murmur uttered
Every fibre quivering there.
For the fanning air that held them
In its soft and silky fold,
With its balmy breath impelled them
Round and round them as it rolled,
Till they shook and danced unceasing
In the sunshine, in the shade,
As it sung with strength increasing,
Or more gently round them played.
What then did their motion shadow
In my fancy, as I lay,
On that green and summer meadow,
At the tofall of the day?
What the image they suggested
To my pleased attracted mind,
As they moved, nor ever rested,
Singing on the waving wind ?
" These," said I, " our life resemble,
And this warbling wind is Time,
And those little leaves that tremble,
In the dazzling summer prime,
" They are men whose life, so restless,
Floats upon the air sublime
Of eternity, resistless,
Shaken by each breath of Time.
" Some in gloom, and some in lustre,
Whirl and flutter, fast and slow —