There are times when a dream delicious 
Steals into a musing hour, 
Like a face with love capricious 
That peeps from a woodland bower; 
And one dear scene comes changeless; 
A wooded hill and a river; 
A deep, cool bend, where the lilies end, 
And the elm-tree shadows quiver. 

And I lie on the brink there, dreaming 
That the life I live is a dream; 
That the real is but the seeming, 
And the true is the sun-flecked stream. 
Beneath me, the perch and the bream sail past 
In the dim cool depths of the river; 
The struggling fly breaks the mirrored sky 
And the elm-tree shadows quiver. 

There are voices of children away on the hill; 
There are bees thro’ the flag-flowers humming; 
The lighter-man calls to the lock, and the mill 
On the farther side is drumming. 
And I sink to sleep in my dream of a dream, 
In the grass by the brink of a river, 
Where the voices blend and the lilies end 
And the elm-tree shadows quiver. 

Like a gift from the past is the kindly dream, 
For the sorrow and passion and pain 
Are adrift like the leaves on the breast of the stream, 
And the child-life comes again. 
O, the sweet sweet pain of a joy that died— 
Of a pain that is joy forever! 
O, the life that died in the stormy tide 
That was once my sun-flecked river. 

Welcome, old Comrade! peeping once again;
Our meeting ’minds me of a pleasant hour:
Spring’s pencil pinks thee in that blushy stain,
And Summer glistens in thy tinty flower.

Hail, Beauty’s Gem! disdaining time nor place;
Carelessly creeping on the dunghill’s side;
Demeanour’s softness in thy crimpled face
Decks thee in beauties unattain’d by pride.

Hail, ’Venturer! once again that fearless here
Encampeth on the hoar hill’s sunny side;
Spring’s early messenger! thou’rt doubly dear;
And winter’s frost by thee is well supplied.

Now winter’s frowns shall cease their pelting rage,
But winter’s woes I need not tell to thee;
Far better luck thy visits well presage,
And be it thine and mine that luck to see.

Ah, may thy smiles confirm the hopes they tell
To see thee frost-bit I’d be griev’d at heart;
I meet thee happy, and I wish thee well,
Till ripening summer summons us to part.

Then like old mates, or two who’ve neighbours been,
We’ll part, in hopes to meet another year;
And o’er thy exit from this changing scene
We’ll mix our wishes in a tokening tear.