The Pine Tree - An 1843 Poetic Expression

By Alfred B. Street.

Stern dweller of the mountain! with thy feet

Grasping the crag, and lifting to the sky

Thy haughty crest! — stern warrior-king thy form

Scarce deigns to shake, when e'en the mighty blast,

Which the strong eagle fears to stern, swoops down

And breaks upon thee. O'er the glimmering chasm

As lean'st thou, with one giant limb outspread,

Thy sceptre, and seamed armor on thy breast,

What is more grand, more glorious than thee!

The headlong torrent pitching at thy base

Sends forth but vassal rumblings, when the storm

Awakes thy thunder; and the puny woods

Seem like bent saplings when thy towering shape

Swings in its majesty. The lightning's dart

Hath streaked, but not consumed thee; upward still,

As the black chariot of the fiend o'er rolls,

Upward still, warrior-king! thy crest doth point,

And in sublime defiance dost thou fling

Thy emerald robe from off thy wounded breast,

For other blows to fall, fierce hissing forth

Thy scorn as flies the tempest. On thy rock,

Thy throne impregnable, thou hast not reigned

During the lapse of ages, for a blast

To break thee, or a lightning shaft to cleave

Thy plumed head to the earth. The hurricane

And showers of blazing levin-bolts alone

Can hurl thee from thy post of centuries.

 

Yet art thou gentle, monarch of the crag!

When all is gentle round thee — when the sky

Is soft with summer, and the sunshine basks

In love upon thy branches, bright-winged birds

Flutter within they plumes, and make thee gay

With their sweet songs; the downy pinioned breeze

Soothes thee, until thou murmurest in a voice

Of blandest music, that upon the ear

Steals sad, but oh, how winning!

 

As thy head

Bears the wild tempest when the rains are launched

In slanted phalanx, as when from the west

The wind fans lightly, and the parted clouds

Let the fresh sunshine lean thy branches drop

Their spinklings on the blossom hung beneath,

Till its blue eye is deeper in its blue,

And floats its sweet breath sweeter; while the moss

That plump and green o'er spreads they iron roots,

Fringed delicate sandals, seems some trysting place,

Where fairy shapes of gold and ebony

Glance o'er in mazy dances. Winter stern,

Howling through forests changed to skeletons

At the first mimicking breath of Autumn, sent

As the mere courier of his dread approach,

Though hurling all his blasts, from thee recoils,

His fury spent in vain : not one slight plume,

No, not the tiniest fibre of thy sprays,

Blanches of falls; but as thou stood at when earth

Leaped living at the blue bird call of Spring,

Unchanged wilt thou again her carol hail,

And tell where passed her timid steps from prints

Of violets and of cowslips.

 

Let us mark,

Proud pine! — thou one of myriad instruments,

Through which mysterious, solemn Nature breathes

The music of her wisdom in our souls —

Oh, let us mark thy likeness in the world,

The wondrous world of man. True Greatness towers

A glorious monarch throned on craggy thought,

Decked in its proud regalia. When the blast

Of Fortune bursts, it bends not; o'er the herd

It spreads its sceptered arm, and weaker souls

Bow, when occasion wakes it energies

In all their native glory. Earth's wild storms

May sweep across it, and their lightnings touch

its lifted crest; but haughtily it dates

The scathing wrath, and casts its deepest scorn

At the endeavor baffled. Glorious gifts

Are not bestowed for every passing cloud

Of life to lay them darkened in the dust.

 

And it is gentle too, when gentle hearts

Are round it; love for love it freely gives,

And while it bears the storm upon its head,

It yields a cherishing care to those that cling

Unto it for protection. In life's change

It changes not; but as it smiled in joy,

So in the bleak waste of adversity

It wears its 'customed look, and welcomes back

The sunshine of renewed prosperity.

March 16, 1843. New York Daily Tribune 2(289): 4. From the Knickerbocker for March.