  THE WATERMILLI’ll rise at midnight and I’ll rove Up the hill and down the drove That leads to the old unnoticed mill, And think of one I used to love: There stooping to the hunching wall I’ll stare into the rush of stars Or bubbles that the waterfall Brings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars. The shelving hills have made a fourm Where the mill holdings shelter warm, And here I came with one I loved To watch the seething millions swarm. But long ago she grew a ghost Though walking with me every day; Even when her beauty burned me most She to a spectre dimmed away— Until though cheeks all morning-bright And black eyes gleaming life’s delight And 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 last I found a Love still lovelier. O lost in tortured days of France! Yet still the moment comes like chance Born in the stirring midnight’s sigh And how I know not but this stream Still sounds like vision’s voice, and still I watch with Love the bubbles gleam, I walk with Love beside the mill. The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet gray Half-moonlight swims the fields till day, The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;— Even this bleak hour is stolen away By this shy water falling low, And calling low the whole night through, And calling back the long ago And richest world I ever knew. The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-white With discord dim turned left and right, And when the wind was south and small The sea’s far whisper drowsed the night; Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voice That in the tumbling water trailed. Love’s spirit called me to rejoice When she to nothingness had paled: For Love the daffodils shone here
In grass the greenest of the year, Daffodils seemed the sunset lights And silver birches budded clear: And all from east to west there strode Great shafted clouds in argent air, The shining chariot-wheels of God, And still Love’s moment sees them there. THE SCYTHEA thick hot haze had choked the valley grounds Long since, the dogday sun had gone his rounds Like a dull coal half lit with sulky heat; And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beat The 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 increase Stood under a curse. Behold, the far release! Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door ‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roar Of marshalled armies in the silent air, And thought Elisha stood beside her there, And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfall She’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall. Faster than armies out of the burnt void The hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed; And when the hay-folks next look up, the sky Sags black above them; scarce is time to fly. And most run for their cottages; but Ward The 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 whirled Hung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled, The brazen light glared round, the haze resolved Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild, Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled, For from the hush of many days the land Had waked itself: and now on every hand Shrill 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 roar Of 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 pause Oncoming voices in the vortex burred. The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurred In 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 still Sat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will, And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swooped With a great hissing rain till terror drooped In weariness: and then there came a roar Ten-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more— But life bursts on him once again, and blood Beats droning round, and light comes in a flood. He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry, The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by, Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. Slow Old Ward lays hand to his old working-friend, And thanking God Whose mercy did defend His servant, yet must drop a tear or two And think of times when that old scythe was new, And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voices Of 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 time is gone when we could throw Our angle in the sleepy stream, And nothing more desired to know Than 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 hay Without a thought but to make haste We came to where the old ring lay And bats and balls seemed heaven at least. With our laughing and our giant strokes The echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks. When the spring came up we got And out among wild Emmet Hills Blossoms, aye and pleasures sought And found! bloom withers, pleasure chills; Like geographers along green brooks We named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks. But one day I found a man Leaning on the bridge’s rail; Dared his face as all to scan, And awestruck wondered what could ail An elder, blest with all the gifts of years, In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears. THE SOUTH-WEST WINDWe stood by the idle weir, Like bells the waters played, The rich moonlight slept everywhere As it would never fade: So slept our shining peace of mind Till rose a south-west wind. How sorrow comes who knows? And here joy surely had been: But joy like any wild wind blows From mountains none has seen, And still its cloudy veilings throws On the bright road it goes. The black-plumed poplars swung So softly across the sky: The ivy sighed, the river sung, Woolpacks were wafting high: The moon her golden tinges flung On these she straight was lost among. O south-west wind of the soul, That brought such new delight, And passing by in music stole Love’s rich and trusting light, Would that we thrilled to thy least breath Now all is still as death. THE CANALThere so dark and still Slept the water, never changing, From the glad sport in the meadows Oft I turned me. Fear would strike me chill On the clearest day in summer, Yet I loved to stand and ponder Hours together By the tarred bridge rail— There the lockman’s vine-clad window, Mirrored in the tomb-like water Stared in silence Till, deformed and pale In the sunken cavern shadows, One by one imagined demons Scowled upon me. Barges passed me by, With their unknown surly masters And small cabins, whereon some rude Hand had painted Trees and castles high. Cheerly stepped the towing horses, And the women sung their children Into slumber. Barges, too, I saw Drowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages, Their gray ribs but seen in summer, Their names never: In whose silted maw Swarmed great eels, the priests of darkness, Old as they, who came at midnight To destroy me. Like one blind and lame Who by some new sense has vision And strikes deadlier than the strongest Went 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 dragoon Who had never a morning hallo, But with stony eye strode onward Till the water, On a silent noon, That had watched him long, commanded: Whom he answered, leaping headlong To 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 knell Sounded through the haze of harvest— Who had found the lame blind water Swift and seeing? THE MARCH BEEA warming wind comes to my resting-place And in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills; Night comes, and yet before she shows her face The sun flings off the shadows, warm light fills The 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 bee Puts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sun And by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to see The flowers that like him best, and seems to shun Cold countless quaking windflowers every one, Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choice Where 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 solitude And most this pleasant bee intent to find The new-born joy, inveigle the rich mind Long after darkness comes cold-lipped to one Still hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun. |
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