Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Scotland: Vols. VI–VIII. 1876–79.
To Leven Water
By James CochraneOn a Railway Being Made on Its Banks
H
That on thy banks no eglantine is seen,
Nor rural song of shepherd heard at e’en,
As when, a boy, thy tangled groves I ranged.
Affection knows no change, and will not know,
In her loved object; she who day by day
Sits by the couch of sickness, sees not grow
Fainter and still more faint the pulse’s play;
Mistakes for coming health the hectic glow,
Till naught is left but the cold, lifeless clay:
Even so before my eyes, year after year,
Inroads were made upon thy rural fame,
But I ne’er saw them till the crisis came,
And then the change, alas! was all too clear.