Explore "Nature" by Henry David Thoreau on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
O Nature! I do not aspire / To be the highest in thy quire, -- / To be a meteor in the sky, / Or comet that may range on high;
Only a zephyr that may blow / Among the reeds by the river low;
Give me thy most privy place / Where to run my airy race.
In some withdrawn, unpublic mead / Let me sigh upon a reed, / Or in the woods, with leafy din, / Whisper the still evening in:
Some still work give me to do, -- / Only -- be it near to you!
For I'd rather be thy child / And pupil, in the forest wild, / Than be the king of men elsewhere, / And most sovereign slave of care:
To have one moment of thy dawn, / Than share the city's year forlorn.