Once, the valley was a silent, smiling hollow, empty of people who had left for war, trusting the mild-eyed stars to guard the flowers. Now, that gentle smile is gone. Visitors find an uncanny restlessness. Nothing remains motionless except the brooding air. Trees shiver like cold seas without a breeze; clouds rustle across the sky, moved by no wind. Violets scattered on the ground mirror myriad human eyes, and lilies bend and weep above a nameless grave. The moisture they shed is eternal—not dew but perennial tears. The valley has become a place of ceaseless, supernatural mourning. Nature itself seems unable to forget; the speaker, wandering this unquiet landscape, senses a grief too deep to name, as if loss has soaked into every trembling leaf and weeping petal. Every violet eye seems to watch, every lily bends in sorrow.
The Valley Of Unrest — Summary
Once it smiled a silent dell Where the people did not dwell; They had gone unto the wars, Trusting to the mild-eyed stars, Nightly, from their azure towers, To keep watch above the flowers, In the midst of which all day The red sun-light lazily lay, Now each visitor shall confess The sad valley's restlessness. Nothing there is motionless-- Nothing save the airs that brood Over the magic solitude. Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees That palpitate like the chill seas Around the misty Hebrides! Ah, by no wind those clouds are driven That rustle through the unquiet Heaven Unceasingly, from morn till even, Over the violets there that lie In myriad types of the human eye-- Over the lilies that wave And weep above a nameless grave! They wave:--from out their fragrant tops Eternal dews come down in drops. They weep:--from off their delicate stems Perennial tears descend in gems.