Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Italy: Vols. XI–XIII. 1876–79.
An Evening Picture
By Walter Savage Landor (17751864)W
Before that villa with its tower,
No braver boys, no father fonder,
Ever prolonged the moonlight hour.
Along the broad stone bench he lies,
The oleander-stems between,
And citron boughs to shade his eyes.
And villas glimmer thick below,
And windows catch the quivering ray,
Obscure one minute’s space ago.
Rise radiant round; the meads are dim,
As if the milky-way had dropped
And filled Valdarno to the brim.
The abbey with unfinished front
Of checkered marble, black and white,
And on the left the Doccia’s font.
Beyond Maiano’s mossy mill,
Winter and Time their enemies,
Without their warder, stately still.
Higher, as years sweep by, and higher
Till every battlement laid low
Is seized and trampled by the brier.
Of Rorezzano; but behold
The graceful tower of Giotto there,
And Duomo’s cross of freshened gold.
Whether the city’s tongue be mute,
We only hear some lover play
(If sighs be play) the sighing flute.