Poems (Spofford)/Our Neighbor

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OUR NEIGHBOR.
Old neighbor, for how many a yearThe same horizon, stretching here,Has held us in its happy boundFrom Rivermouth to Ipswich Sound!How many a wave-washed day we've seenAbove that low horizon lean,And marked within the MerrimackThe self-same sunset reddening back,Or in the Powow's shining stream,That silent river of a dream!
Where Craneneck o'er the woody gloomLifts her steep mile of apple-bloom;Where Salisbury Sands, in yellow length,With the great breaker measures strength;Where Artichoke in shadow slides,The lily on her painted tides,—There 's naught in the enchanted viewThat does not seem a part of you; ​Your legends hang on every hill,Your songs have made it dearer still.
Yours is the river-road; and yoursAre all the mighty meadow floorsWhere the long Hampton levels lieAlone between the sea and sky.Fresher in Follymill shall blowThe Mayflowers, that you loved them so;Prouder Deer Island's ancient pinesToss to their measure in your lines;And purpler gleam old Appledore,Because your foot has trod her shore.
Still shall the great Cape wade to meetThe storms that fawn about her feet,The summer evening linger lateIn many-rivered Stackyard Gate,When we, when all your people here,Have fled. But like the atmosphere,You still the region shall surround,The spirit of the sacred ground,Though you have risen, as mounts the star,Into horizons vaster far!
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