James Gates Percival (1795–1856)

DEEP sunk in thought, he sat beside the river,

Its wave in liquid lapses glided by,

Nor watched, in crystal depth, his vacant eye

The willow’s high o’erarching foliage quiver.

From dream to shadowy dream returning ever,

He sat, like statue, on the grassy verge;

His thoughts, a phantom train, in airy surge

Streamed visionary onward, pausing never.

As autumn wind, in mountain forest weaving

Its wondrous tapestry of leaf and bower,

O’ermastering the night’s resplendent flower

With tints, like hues of heaven, the eye deceiving;

So, lost in labyrinthine maze, he wove

A wreath of flowers; the golden thread was love.