TEXT

Out of the hills of Habersham,
Down the valleys of Hall,
I hurry to reach the plain,
Run the rapid and leap the fall,
Split at the rock and together again,
Accept my bed, narrow or wide,
And flee from folly on every side
With a lover’s pain to attain the plain,
Far from the hills of Habersham,
Far from the valleys of Hall.

All down the hills of Habersham,
All through the valleys of Hall,
The rushes cried, Abide, Abide,
The willful waterweeds held me thrall,
The laving laurel turned my tide,
The ferns and the fondling grass said Stay,
The dewberry dipped for to work delay,
And the little reeds sighed, Abide, Abide,
Here in the hills of Habersham,
Here in the valleys of Hall.

But oh not the hills of Habersham,
And oh not the valleys of Hall avail:
I am fain for to water the plain.
Downward the voices of Duty call-
Downward to toil and be mixed with the main
The dry fields burn, and the mills are to turn
And a myriad flowers mortally yearn
And the lordly main from beyond the plain
Calls o’er the hills of Habersham,
Calls through the valleys of Hall.

ANALYSIS

In this poem Lanier’s two great loves-music and the outdoor scenes of Nature-are mingled as he pictures the swift course of a river with onomatopoeic sounds (word music) that echo the rippling and dashing of the water. Chattahoochee, the name of the river, is of Indian origin, suggesting a musical and flowing sound. The river melodiously leaps through rocks from the hills of Habersham, rushing on merrily and patiently (”with a lover’s pain”) to the plain to heed the call of Duty: to water the dry fields and the thirsty flowers, to turn the mills. Beauties along the way tempt the river to linger-the rushes, waterweeds, laurel, ferns, grass, dewberry, reeds-but the river unheedingly goes on to “run the rapid and leap the fall/Split at the rock…/And flee from folly…./ The lines suggest the rhythm (movement) that impels the river toward the plain.

No direct moral is stated, but from reading between the lines the music of the river and its hurried journey to reach the plain suggest Nature’s effort to speak to man: the duty of being happy to know that we are useful in our own way according to our powers. A river suggests a path which carries us whither we desire to go.

The persona (speaker assigned by the poet) which is the river Chattahoochee speaks in the “confessional pronoun” I, a technique which personifies the river. The beauties along the way are also given human attributes through personification: the rushes and the reeds that cry Abide, Abide; the waterweeds that are “willful”; the laurel that turns the river’s tide; the ferns and fondling grass that say Stay; the dewberry dipped for work….

To make melody or music the poem makes use of rhyme, alliteration (repetition of initial letters of a word), and repetition.

Rhymed words make the poem’s pattern intricate and well-organized. Internal rhymes (a word in the center of a line rhyming with the end word) contribute to its melody. (Find them.)

Examples of alliteration: high o’er the hills of Habersham, far from the hills, here in the hills of Habersham, flee from folly, willful waterweeds, laving laurel, turned my tide, ferns and fondling grass, dewberry dipped for work, veiling the valleys, shadowy self, pain to attain the plain, run the rapid….

Repetition is another technique to make melody. Examples of words repeated: abide, downward, calls, Habersham, Hall, plain, valleys, hills, I…. Refrain at the end of every stanza repeats the first two lines of each stanza with a slight variation. (Read them aloud to yourself to savor the sonorous melody.)

Lord Alfred Tennyson’s “The Brook” is often compared with “Song of the Chattahoochee”. Find it. ###