EDMUND BLUNDENTHE WATERMILLI’llrise at midnight and I’ll roveUp the hill and down the droveThat leads to the old unnoticed mill,And think of one I used to love:There stooping to the hunching wallI’ll stare into the rush of starsOr bubbles that the waterfallBrings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars.The shelving hills have made a fourmWhere the mill holdings shelter warm,And here I came with one I lovedTo watch the seething millions swarm.But long ago she grew a ghostThough walking with me every day;Even when her beauty burned me mostShe to a spectre dimmed away—Until though cheeks all morning-brightAnd black eyes gleaming life’s delightAnd singing voice dwelt in my sense,Herself paled on my inward sight.She grew one whom deep waters glassed.Then in dismay I hid from her,And lone by talking brooks at lastI found a Love still lovelier.O lost in tortured days of France!Yet still the moment comes like chanceBorn in the stirring midnight’s sighOr in the wild wet sunset’s glance:And how I know not but this streamStill sounds like vision’s voice, and stillI watch with Love the bubbles gleam,I walk with Love beside the mill.The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet grayHalf-moonlight swims the fields till day,The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;—Even this bleak hour is stolen awayBy this shy water falling low,And calling low the whole night through,And calling back the long agoAnd richest world I ever knew.The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-whiteWith discord dim turned left and right,And when the wind was south and smallThe sea’s far whisper drowsed the night;Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voiceThat in the tumbling water trailed.Love’s spirit called me to rejoiceWhen she to nothingness had paled:For Love the daffodils shone hereIn grass the greenest of the year,Daffodils seemed the sunset lightsAnd silver birches budded clear:And all from east to west there strodeGreat shafted clouds in argent air,The shining chariot-wheels of God,And still Love’s moment sees them there.THE SCYTHEA thickhot haze had choked the valley groundsLong since, the dogday sun had gone his roundsLike a dull coal half lit with sulky heat;And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beatThe blackening flies round moody cattle’s eyes.Wasps on the mudbanks seemed a hornet’s size,That on the dead roach battened. The plough’s increaseStood under a curse.Behold, the far release!Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roarOf marshalled armies in the silent air,And thought Elisha stood beside her there,And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfallShe’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall.Faster than armies out of the burnt voidThe hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed;And when the hay-folks next look up, the skySags black above them; scarce is time to fly.And most run for their cottages; but WardThe mower for the inn beside the ford,And slow strides he with shouldered scythe still bare,While to the coverts leaps the great-eyed hare.As he came in, the dust snatched up and whirledHung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled,The brazen light glared round, the haze resolvedInto demoniac shapes bulged and convolved.Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild,Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled,For from the hush of many days the landHad waked itself: and now on every handShrill swift alarm-notes, cries and counter-cries,Lowings and crowings came and throbbing sighs.Now atom lightning brandished on the moor,Then out of sullen drumming came the roarOf thunder joining battle east and west:In hedge and orchard small birds durst not rest,Flittering like dead leaves and like wisps of straws,And the cuckoo called again, for without pauseOncoming voices in the vortex burred.The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurredIn grey the trees that like black steeples towered.The sun’s last yellow died. Then who but cowered?Down ruddying darkness floods the hideous flash,And pole to pole the cataract whirlwinds clash.Alone within the tavern parlour stillSat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will,And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swoopedWith a great hissing rain till terror droopedIn weariness: and then there came a roarTen-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more—But life bursts on him once again, and bloodBeats droning round, and light comes in a flood.He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry,The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by,His twisted scythe, melted by its fierce foe,Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. SlowOld Ward lays hand to his old working-friend,And thanking God Whose mercy did defendHis servant, yet must drop a tear or twoAnd think of times when that old scythe was new,And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voicesOf many a bird that through the land rejoices,Nor sees through the smashed panes the sea-green sky,That ripens into blue, nor knows the storm is by.THE TIME IS GONEThe timeis gone when we could throwOur angle in the sleepy stream,And nothing more desired to knowThan was it roach or was it bream?Sitting there in such a mute delight,The Kingfisher would come and on the rods alight.Or hurrying through the dewy hayWithout a thought but to make hasteWe came to where the old ring layAnd bats and balls seemed heaven at least.With our laughing and our giant strokesThe echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks.When the spring came up we gotAnd out among wild Emmet HillsBlossoms, aye and pleasures soughtAnd found! bloom withers, pleasure chills;Like geographers along green brooksWe named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks.But one day I found a manLeaning on the bridge’s rail;Dared his face as all to scan,And awestruck wondered what could ailAn elder, blest with all the gifts of years,In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears.THE SOUTH-WEST WINDWe stoodby the idle weir,Like bells the waters played,The rich moonlight slept everywhereAs it would never fade:So slept our shining peace of mindTill rose a south-west wind.How sorrow comes who knows?And here joy surely had been:But joy like any wild wind blowsFrom mountains none has seen,And still its cloudy veilings throwsOn the bright road it goes.The black-plumed poplars swungSo softly across the sky:The ivy sighed, the river sung,Woolpacks were wafting high:The moon her golden tinges flungOn these she straight was lost among.O south-west wind of the soul,That brought such new delight,And passing by in music stoleLove’s rich and trusting light,Would that we thrilled to thy least breathNow all is still as death.THE CANALThereso dark and stillSlept the water, never changing,From the glad sport in the meadowsOft I turned me.Fear would strike me chillOn the clearest day in summer,Yet I loved to stand and ponderHours togetherBy the tarred bridge rail—There the lockman’s vine-clad window,Mirrored in the tomb-like waterStared in silenceTill, deformed and paleIn the sunken cavern shadows,One by one imagined demonsScowled upon me.Barges passed me by,With their unknown surly mastersAnd small cabins, whereon some rudeHand had paintedTrees and castles high.Cheerly stepped the towing horses,And the women sung their childrenInto slumber.Barges, too, I sawDrowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages,Their gray ribs but seen in summer,Their names never:In whose silted mawSwarmed great eels, the priests of darkness,Old as they, who came at midnightTo destroy me.Like one blind and lameWho by some new sense has visionAnd strikes deadlier than the strongestWent this water.Many an angler came,Went his ways; and I would know them,Some would smile and give me greeting,Some kept silence—Most, one old dragoonWho had never a morning hallo,But with stony eye strode onwardTill the water,On a silent noon,That had watched him long, commanded:Whom he answered, leaping headlongTo self-murder.‘Fear and fly the spell,’Thus my Spirit sang beside me;Then once more I ranged the meadows,Yet still brooded,When the threefold knellSounded through the haze of harvest—Who had found the lame blind waterSwift and seeing?THE MARCH BEEA warmingwind comes to my resting-placeAnd in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills;Night comes, and yet before she shows her faceThe sun flings off the shadows, warm light fillsThe valley and the clearings on the hills,Bleak crow the moorcocks on the fen’s blue plashes,But here I warm myself with these bright looks and flashes.And like to me the merry humble beePuts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sunAnd by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to seeThe flowers that like him best, and seems to shunCold countless quaking windflowers every one,Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choiceWhere small wood-strawberry blossoms nestle and rejoice.The magpies steering round from wood to wood,Tree-creepers flicking up to elms’ green rind,Bold gnats that revel round my solitudeAnd most this pleasant bee intent to findThe new-born joy, inveigle the rich mindLong after darkness comes cold-lipped to oneStill hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun.
EDMUND BLUNDEN
I’llrise at midnight and I’ll roveUp the hill and down the droveThat leads to the old unnoticed mill,And think of one I used to love:There stooping to the hunching wallI’ll stare into the rush of starsOr bubbles that the waterfallBrings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars.The shelving hills have made a fourmWhere the mill holdings shelter warm,And here I came with one I lovedTo watch the seething millions swarm.But long ago she grew a ghostThough walking with me every day;Even when her beauty burned me mostShe to a spectre dimmed away—Until though cheeks all morning-brightAnd black eyes gleaming life’s delightAnd singing voice dwelt in my sense,Herself paled on my inward sight.She grew one whom deep waters glassed.Then in dismay I hid from her,And lone by talking brooks at lastI found a Love still lovelier.O lost in tortured days of France!Yet still the moment comes like chanceBorn in the stirring midnight’s sighOr in the wild wet sunset’s glance:And how I know not but this streamStill sounds like vision’s voice, and stillI watch with Love the bubbles gleam,I walk with Love beside the mill.The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet grayHalf-moonlight swims the fields till day,The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;—Even this bleak hour is stolen awayBy this shy water falling low,And calling low the whole night through,And calling back the long agoAnd richest world I ever knew.The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-whiteWith discord dim turned left and right,And when the wind was south and smallThe sea’s far whisper drowsed the night;Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voiceThat in the tumbling water trailed.Love’s spirit called me to rejoiceWhen she to nothingness had paled:For Love the daffodils shone hereIn grass the greenest of the year,Daffodils seemed the sunset lightsAnd silver birches budded clear:And all from east to west there strodeGreat shafted clouds in argent air,The shining chariot-wheels of God,And still Love’s moment sees them there.
I’llrise at midnight and I’ll roveUp the hill and down the droveThat leads to the old unnoticed mill,And think of one I used to love:There stooping to the hunching wallI’ll stare into the rush of starsOr bubbles that the waterfallBrings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars.The shelving hills have made a fourmWhere the mill holdings shelter warm,And here I came with one I lovedTo watch the seething millions swarm.But long ago she grew a ghostThough walking with me every day;Even when her beauty burned me mostShe to a spectre dimmed away—Until though cheeks all morning-brightAnd black eyes gleaming life’s delightAnd singing voice dwelt in my sense,Herself paled on my inward sight.She grew one whom deep waters glassed.Then in dismay I hid from her,And lone by talking brooks at lastI found a Love still lovelier.O lost in tortured days of France!Yet still the moment comes like chanceBorn in the stirring midnight’s sighOr in the wild wet sunset’s glance:And how I know not but this streamStill sounds like vision’s voice, and stillI watch with Love the bubbles gleam,I walk with Love beside the mill.The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet grayHalf-moonlight swims the fields till day,The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;—Even this bleak hour is stolen awayBy this shy water falling low,And calling low the whole night through,And calling back the long agoAnd richest world I ever knew.The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-whiteWith discord dim turned left and right,And when the wind was south and smallThe sea’s far whisper drowsed the night;Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voiceThat in the tumbling water trailed.Love’s spirit called me to rejoiceWhen she to nothingness had paled:For Love the daffodils shone hereIn grass the greenest of the year,Daffodils seemed the sunset lightsAnd silver birches budded clear:And all from east to west there strodeGreat shafted clouds in argent air,The shining chariot-wheels of God,And still Love’s moment sees them there.
I’llrise at midnight and I’ll roveUp the hill and down the droveThat leads to the old unnoticed mill,And think of one I used to love:There stooping to the hunching wallI’ll stare into the rush of starsOr bubbles that the waterfallBrings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars.
The shelving hills have made a fourmWhere the mill holdings shelter warm,And here I came with one I lovedTo watch the seething millions swarm.But long ago she grew a ghostThough walking with me every day;Even when her beauty burned me mostShe to a spectre dimmed away—
Until though cheeks all morning-brightAnd black eyes gleaming life’s delightAnd singing voice dwelt in my sense,Herself paled on my inward sight.She grew one whom deep waters glassed.Then in dismay I hid from her,And lone by talking brooks at lastI found a Love still lovelier.
O lost in tortured days of France!Yet still the moment comes like chanceBorn in the stirring midnight’s sighOr in the wild wet sunset’s glance:And how I know not but this streamStill sounds like vision’s voice, and stillI watch with Love the bubbles gleam,I walk with Love beside the mill.
The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet grayHalf-moonlight swims the fields till day,The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;—Even this bleak hour is stolen awayBy this shy water falling low,And calling low the whole night through,And calling back the long agoAnd richest world I ever knew.
The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-whiteWith discord dim turned left and right,And when the wind was south and smallThe sea’s far whisper drowsed the night;Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voiceThat in the tumbling water trailed.Love’s spirit called me to rejoiceWhen she to nothingness had paled:
For Love the daffodils shone hereIn grass the greenest of the year,Daffodils seemed the sunset lightsAnd silver birches budded clear:And all from east to west there strodeGreat shafted clouds in argent air,The shining chariot-wheels of God,And still Love’s moment sees them there.
A thickhot haze had choked the valley groundsLong since, the dogday sun had gone his roundsLike a dull coal half lit with sulky heat;And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beatThe blackening flies round moody cattle’s eyes.Wasps on the mudbanks seemed a hornet’s size,That on the dead roach battened. The plough’s increaseStood under a curse.Behold, the far release!Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roarOf marshalled armies in the silent air,And thought Elisha stood beside her there,And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfallShe’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall.Faster than armies out of the burnt voidThe hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed;And when the hay-folks next look up, the skySags black above them; scarce is time to fly.And most run for their cottages; but WardThe mower for the inn beside the ford,And slow strides he with shouldered scythe still bare,While to the coverts leaps the great-eyed hare.As he came in, the dust snatched up and whirledHung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled,The brazen light glared round, the haze resolvedInto demoniac shapes bulged and convolved.Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild,Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled,For from the hush of many days the landHad waked itself: and now on every handShrill swift alarm-notes, cries and counter-cries,Lowings and crowings came and throbbing sighs.Now atom lightning brandished on the moor,Then out of sullen drumming came the roarOf thunder joining battle east and west:In hedge and orchard small birds durst not rest,Flittering like dead leaves and like wisps of straws,And the cuckoo called again, for without pauseOncoming voices in the vortex burred.The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurredIn grey the trees that like black steeples towered.The sun’s last yellow died. Then who but cowered?Down ruddying darkness floods the hideous flash,And pole to pole the cataract whirlwinds clash.Alone within the tavern parlour stillSat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will,And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swoopedWith a great hissing rain till terror droopedIn weariness: and then there came a roarTen-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more—But life bursts on him once again, and bloodBeats droning round, and light comes in a flood.He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry,The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by,His twisted scythe, melted by its fierce foe,Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. SlowOld Ward lays hand to his old working-friend,And thanking God Whose mercy did defendHis servant, yet must drop a tear or twoAnd think of times when that old scythe was new,And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voicesOf many a bird that through the land rejoices,Nor sees through the smashed panes the sea-green sky,That ripens into blue, nor knows the storm is by.
A thickhot haze had choked the valley groundsLong since, the dogday sun had gone his roundsLike a dull coal half lit with sulky heat;And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beatThe blackening flies round moody cattle’s eyes.Wasps on the mudbanks seemed a hornet’s size,That on the dead roach battened. The plough’s increaseStood under a curse.Behold, the far release!Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roarOf marshalled armies in the silent air,And thought Elisha stood beside her there,And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfallShe’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall.Faster than armies out of the burnt voidThe hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed;And when the hay-folks next look up, the skySags black above them; scarce is time to fly.And most run for their cottages; but WardThe mower for the inn beside the ford,And slow strides he with shouldered scythe still bare,While to the coverts leaps the great-eyed hare.As he came in, the dust snatched up and whirledHung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled,The brazen light glared round, the haze resolvedInto demoniac shapes bulged and convolved.Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild,Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled,For from the hush of many days the landHad waked itself: and now on every handShrill swift alarm-notes, cries and counter-cries,Lowings and crowings came and throbbing sighs.Now atom lightning brandished on the moor,Then out of sullen drumming came the roarOf thunder joining battle east and west:In hedge and orchard small birds durst not rest,Flittering like dead leaves and like wisps of straws,And the cuckoo called again, for without pauseOncoming voices in the vortex burred.The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurredIn grey the trees that like black steeples towered.The sun’s last yellow died. Then who but cowered?Down ruddying darkness floods the hideous flash,And pole to pole the cataract whirlwinds clash.Alone within the tavern parlour stillSat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will,And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swoopedWith a great hissing rain till terror droopedIn weariness: and then there came a roarTen-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more—But life bursts on him once again, and bloodBeats droning round, and light comes in a flood.He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry,The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by,His twisted scythe, melted by its fierce foe,Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. SlowOld Ward lays hand to his old working-friend,And thanking God Whose mercy did defendHis servant, yet must drop a tear or twoAnd think of times when that old scythe was new,And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voicesOf many a bird that through the land rejoices,Nor sees through the smashed panes the sea-green sky,That ripens into blue, nor knows the storm is by.
A thickhot haze had choked the valley groundsLong since, the dogday sun had gone his roundsLike a dull coal half lit with sulky heat;And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beatThe blackening flies round moody cattle’s eyes.Wasps on the mudbanks seemed a hornet’s size,That on the dead roach battened. The plough’s increaseStood under a curse.Behold, the far release!Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roarOf marshalled armies in the silent air,And thought Elisha stood beside her there,And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfallShe’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall.
Faster than armies out of the burnt voidThe hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed;And when the hay-folks next look up, the skySags black above them; scarce is time to fly.And most run for their cottages; but WardThe mower for the inn beside the ford,And slow strides he with shouldered scythe still bare,While to the coverts leaps the great-eyed hare.
As he came in, the dust snatched up and whirledHung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled,The brazen light glared round, the haze resolvedInto demoniac shapes bulged and convolved.Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild,Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled,For from the hush of many days the landHad waked itself: and now on every handShrill swift alarm-notes, cries and counter-cries,Lowings and crowings came and throbbing sighs.Now atom lightning brandished on the moor,Then out of sullen drumming came the roarOf thunder joining battle east and west:In hedge and orchard small birds durst not rest,Flittering like dead leaves and like wisps of straws,And the cuckoo called again, for without pauseOncoming voices in the vortex burred.The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurredIn grey the trees that like black steeples towered.The sun’s last yellow died. Then who but cowered?Down ruddying darkness floods the hideous flash,And pole to pole the cataract whirlwinds clash.
Alone within the tavern parlour stillSat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will,And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swoopedWith a great hissing rain till terror droopedIn weariness: and then there came a roarTen-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more—But life bursts on him once again, and bloodBeats droning round, and light comes in a flood.
He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry,The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by,His twisted scythe, melted by its fierce foe,Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. SlowOld Ward lays hand to his old working-friend,And thanking God Whose mercy did defendHis servant, yet must drop a tear or twoAnd think of times when that old scythe was new,And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voicesOf many a bird that through the land rejoices,Nor sees through the smashed panes the sea-green sky,That ripens into blue, nor knows the storm is by.
The timeis gone when we could throwOur angle in the sleepy stream,And nothing more desired to knowThan was it roach or was it bream?Sitting there in such a mute delight,The Kingfisher would come and on the rods alight.Or hurrying through the dewy hayWithout a thought but to make hasteWe came to where the old ring layAnd bats and balls seemed heaven at least.With our laughing and our giant strokesThe echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks.When the spring came up we gotAnd out among wild Emmet HillsBlossoms, aye and pleasures soughtAnd found! bloom withers, pleasure chills;Like geographers along green brooksWe named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks.But one day I found a manLeaning on the bridge’s rail;Dared his face as all to scan,And awestruck wondered what could ailAn elder, blest with all the gifts of years,In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears.
The timeis gone when we could throwOur angle in the sleepy stream,And nothing more desired to knowThan was it roach or was it bream?Sitting there in such a mute delight,The Kingfisher would come and on the rods alight.Or hurrying through the dewy hayWithout a thought but to make hasteWe came to where the old ring layAnd bats and balls seemed heaven at least.With our laughing and our giant strokesThe echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks.When the spring came up we gotAnd out among wild Emmet HillsBlossoms, aye and pleasures soughtAnd found! bloom withers, pleasure chills;Like geographers along green brooksWe named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks.But one day I found a manLeaning on the bridge’s rail;Dared his face as all to scan,And awestruck wondered what could ailAn elder, blest with all the gifts of years,In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears.
The timeis gone when we could throwOur angle in the sleepy stream,And nothing more desired to knowThan was it roach or was it bream?Sitting there in such a mute delight,The Kingfisher would come and on the rods alight.
Or hurrying through the dewy hayWithout a thought but to make hasteWe came to where the old ring layAnd bats and balls seemed heaven at least.With our laughing and our giant strokesThe echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks.
When the spring came up we gotAnd out among wild Emmet HillsBlossoms, aye and pleasures soughtAnd found! bloom withers, pleasure chills;Like geographers along green brooksWe named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks.
But one day I found a manLeaning on the bridge’s rail;Dared his face as all to scan,And awestruck wondered what could ailAn elder, blest with all the gifts of years,In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears.
We stoodby the idle weir,Like bells the waters played,The rich moonlight slept everywhereAs it would never fade:So slept our shining peace of mindTill rose a south-west wind.How sorrow comes who knows?And here joy surely had been:But joy like any wild wind blowsFrom mountains none has seen,And still its cloudy veilings throwsOn the bright road it goes.The black-plumed poplars swungSo softly across the sky:The ivy sighed, the river sung,Woolpacks were wafting high:The moon her golden tinges flungOn these she straight was lost among.O south-west wind of the soul,That brought such new delight,And passing by in music stoleLove’s rich and trusting light,Would that we thrilled to thy least breathNow all is still as death.
We stoodby the idle weir,Like bells the waters played,The rich moonlight slept everywhereAs it would never fade:So slept our shining peace of mindTill rose a south-west wind.How sorrow comes who knows?And here joy surely had been:But joy like any wild wind blowsFrom mountains none has seen,And still its cloudy veilings throwsOn the bright road it goes.The black-plumed poplars swungSo softly across the sky:The ivy sighed, the river sung,Woolpacks were wafting high:The moon her golden tinges flungOn these she straight was lost among.O south-west wind of the soul,That brought such new delight,And passing by in music stoleLove’s rich and trusting light,Would that we thrilled to thy least breathNow all is still as death.
We stoodby the idle weir,Like bells the waters played,The rich moonlight slept everywhereAs it would never fade:So slept our shining peace of mindTill rose a south-west wind.
How sorrow comes who knows?And here joy surely had been:But joy like any wild wind blowsFrom mountains none has seen,And still its cloudy veilings throwsOn the bright road it goes.
The black-plumed poplars swungSo softly across the sky:The ivy sighed, the river sung,Woolpacks were wafting high:The moon her golden tinges flungOn these she straight was lost among.
O south-west wind of the soul,That brought such new delight,And passing by in music stoleLove’s rich and trusting light,Would that we thrilled to thy least breathNow all is still as death.
Thereso dark and stillSlept the water, never changing,From the glad sport in the meadowsOft I turned me.Fear would strike me chillOn the clearest day in summer,Yet I loved to stand and ponderHours togetherBy the tarred bridge rail—There the lockman’s vine-clad window,Mirrored in the tomb-like waterStared in silenceTill, deformed and paleIn the sunken cavern shadows,One by one imagined demonsScowled upon me.Barges passed me by,With their unknown surly mastersAnd small cabins, whereon some rudeHand had paintedTrees and castles high.Cheerly stepped the towing horses,And the women sung their childrenInto slumber.Barges, too, I sawDrowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages,Their gray ribs but seen in summer,Their names never:In whose silted mawSwarmed great eels, the priests of darkness,Old as they, who came at midnightTo destroy me.Like one blind and lameWho by some new sense has visionAnd strikes deadlier than the strongestWent this water.Many an angler came,Went his ways; and I would know them,Some would smile and give me greeting,Some kept silence—Most, one old dragoonWho had never a morning hallo,But with stony eye strode onwardTill the water,On a silent noon,That had watched him long, commanded:Whom he answered, leaping headlongTo self-murder.‘Fear and fly the spell,’Thus my Spirit sang beside me;Then once more I ranged the meadows,Yet still brooded,When the threefold knellSounded through the haze of harvest—Who had found the lame blind waterSwift and seeing?
Thereso dark and stillSlept the water, never changing,From the glad sport in the meadowsOft I turned me.Fear would strike me chillOn the clearest day in summer,Yet I loved to stand and ponderHours togetherBy the tarred bridge rail—There the lockman’s vine-clad window,Mirrored in the tomb-like waterStared in silenceTill, deformed and paleIn the sunken cavern shadows,One by one imagined demonsScowled upon me.Barges passed me by,With their unknown surly mastersAnd small cabins, whereon some rudeHand had paintedTrees and castles high.Cheerly stepped the towing horses,And the women sung their childrenInto slumber.Barges, too, I sawDrowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages,Their gray ribs but seen in summer,Their names never:In whose silted mawSwarmed great eels, the priests of darkness,Old as they, who came at midnightTo destroy me.Like one blind and lameWho by some new sense has visionAnd strikes deadlier than the strongestWent this water.Many an angler came,Went his ways; and I would know them,Some would smile and give me greeting,Some kept silence—Most, one old dragoonWho had never a morning hallo,But with stony eye strode onwardTill the water,On a silent noon,That had watched him long, commanded:Whom he answered, leaping headlongTo self-murder.‘Fear and fly the spell,’Thus my Spirit sang beside me;Then once more I ranged the meadows,Yet still brooded,When the threefold knellSounded through the haze of harvest—Who had found the lame blind waterSwift and seeing?
Thereso dark and stillSlept the water, never changing,From the glad sport in the meadowsOft I turned me.
Fear would strike me chillOn the clearest day in summer,Yet I loved to stand and ponderHours together
By the tarred bridge rail—There the lockman’s vine-clad window,Mirrored in the tomb-like waterStared in silence
Till, deformed and paleIn the sunken cavern shadows,One by one imagined demonsScowled upon me.
Barges passed me by,With their unknown surly mastersAnd small cabins, whereon some rudeHand had painted
Trees and castles high.Cheerly stepped the towing horses,And the women sung their childrenInto slumber.
Barges, too, I sawDrowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages,Their gray ribs but seen in summer,Their names never:
In whose silted mawSwarmed great eels, the priests of darkness,Old as they, who came at midnightTo destroy me.
Like one blind and lameWho by some new sense has visionAnd strikes deadlier than the strongestWent this water.
Many an angler came,Went his ways; and I would know them,Some would smile and give me greeting,Some kept silence—
Most, one old dragoonWho had never a morning hallo,But with stony eye strode onwardTill the water,
On a silent noon,That had watched him long, commanded:Whom he answered, leaping headlongTo self-murder.
‘Fear and fly the spell,’Thus my Spirit sang beside me;Then once more I ranged the meadows,Yet still brooded,
When the threefold knellSounded through the haze of harvest—Who had found the lame blind waterSwift and seeing?
A warmingwind comes to my resting-placeAnd in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills;Night comes, and yet before she shows her faceThe sun flings off the shadows, warm light fillsThe valley and the clearings on the hills,Bleak crow the moorcocks on the fen’s blue plashes,But here I warm myself with these bright looks and flashes.And like to me the merry humble beePuts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sunAnd by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to seeThe flowers that like him best, and seems to shunCold countless quaking windflowers every one,Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choiceWhere small wood-strawberry blossoms nestle and rejoice.The magpies steering round from wood to wood,Tree-creepers flicking up to elms’ green rind,Bold gnats that revel round my solitudeAnd most this pleasant bee intent to findThe new-born joy, inveigle the rich mindLong after darkness comes cold-lipped to oneStill hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun.
A warmingwind comes to my resting-placeAnd in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills;Night comes, and yet before she shows her faceThe sun flings off the shadows, warm light fillsThe valley and the clearings on the hills,Bleak crow the moorcocks on the fen’s blue plashes,But here I warm myself with these bright looks and flashes.And like to me the merry humble beePuts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sunAnd by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to seeThe flowers that like him best, and seems to shunCold countless quaking windflowers every one,Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choiceWhere small wood-strawberry blossoms nestle and rejoice.The magpies steering round from wood to wood,Tree-creepers flicking up to elms’ green rind,Bold gnats that revel round my solitudeAnd most this pleasant bee intent to findThe new-born joy, inveigle the rich mindLong after darkness comes cold-lipped to oneStill hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun.
A warmingwind comes to my resting-placeAnd in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills;Night comes, and yet before she shows her faceThe sun flings off the shadows, warm light fillsThe valley and the clearings on the hills,Bleak crow the moorcocks on the fen’s blue plashes,But here I warm myself with these bright looks and flashes.And like to me the merry humble beePuts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sunAnd by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to seeThe flowers that like him best, and seems to shunCold countless quaking windflowers every one,Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choiceWhere small wood-strawberry blossoms nestle and rejoice.The magpies steering round from wood to wood,Tree-creepers flicking up to elms’ green rind,Bold gnats that revel round my solitudeAnd most this pleasant bee intent to findThe new-born joy, inveigle the rich mindLong after darkness comes cold-lipped to oneStill hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun.