Avenue In Savernake Forest

How soothing sound the gentle airs that move     The innumerable leaves, high overhead,     When autumn first, from the long avenue,     That lifts its arching height of ancient shade,     Steals here and there a leaf!         Within the gloom,     In partial sunshine white, some trunks appear,     Studding the glens of fern; in solemn shade     Some mingle their dark branches, but yet all,     All make a sad sweet music, as they move,     Not undelightful to a stranger's heart.     They seem to say, in accents audible,     Farewell to summer, and farewell the strains     Of many a lithe and feathered chorister,     That through the depth of these incumbent woods     Made the long summer gladsome.         I have heard     To the deep-mingling sounds of organs clear,     (When slow the choral anthem rose beneath),     The glimmering minster, through its pillared aisles,     Echo; but not more sweet the vaulted roof     Rang to those linked harmonies, than here     The high wood answers to the lightest breath     Of nature.     Oh, may such sweet music steal,     Soothing the cares of venerable age,[1]     From public toil retired: may it awake,     As, still and slow, the sun of life declines,     Remembrances, not mournful, but most sweet;     May it, as oft beneath the sylvan shade     Their honoured owner strays, come like the sound     Of distant seraph harps, yet speaking clear!     How poor is every sound of earthly things,     When heaven's own music waits the just and pure!