Archibald Lampman

Solitude

HOW still it is here in the woods. The trees
    Stand motionless, as if they do not dare
    To stir, lest it should break the spell. The air
Hangs quiet as spaces in a marble frieze.
Even this little brook, that runs at ease,
    Whispering and gurgling in its knotted bed,
    Seems but to deepen with its curling thread
Of sound the shadowy sun-pierced silences.

Sometimes a hawk screams or a woodpecker
    Startles the stillness from its fixèd mood
With his loud careless tap. Sometimes I hear
       The dreamy white-throat from some far-off tree
    Pipe slowly on the listening solitude
       His five pure notes succeeding pensively.