"woodlands" poems
Rolling down St. John's Heritage Highway
after Sean, my grandson's birthday party
I belt out my pioneer song with vigor
echoing across the vast beauty,
wide open, sacred spaces
pristine vistas
Norman Rockwell cows grazing
in bygone pastures happily
moo along
Driving past the yellow deer crossing sign
Florida woodlands giddyap near the edge of the road
long brown antlers prancing to
a timeless rhythm
I hope and pray that I can somehow
kindle a spark of appreciation
in my niece and grandsons
so that they may behold
the baffling greatness
and mystery that is our universe
These young'uns are mighty attached to the
virtual reality, world and landscape
of computer technology
A sprinkling of cowboy stars flash
an omnipresent wink
Sunset bonfire explodes across
the frontier horizon
Turning the corner onto Emerson Drive
smoldering scarlet orange embers
reflecting lights
shoot fireworks, launch rockets
through an ever expanding field of vision
Sep 2, 2018
Sep 2, 2018 at 1:21 PM UTC
It's cold in Duhallow this morning and the fields that were green yesterday
Lay chilled to the frost that the night brought a cover of silvery gray
And the little dunnock on bare hedgerow too cold and too hungry to sing
On **** branch he perch sad and silent the hardship that January can bring.
The robins and sparrows by back door like beggars they wait to be fed
In hope that when breakfast is eaten the housewife might throw out some bread
With no thought for song or for nesting their battle is to stay alive
How many will live to see April the Winter so hard to survive?
The first heavy snows of the Winter have fallen on the higher ground
On Clara, Shrone and Caherbarnagh the hills are so white all around
The blackbird and thrush on the bare branch their feathers fluffed against the chill
And hare has come down to the lowland there's nothing to eat on the hill.
But I can remember the bright days when sun shone on the leafy tree
And robins and thrushes and finches piped in the woods of Knocknagree
And to her nest on barn rafters the sparrow brought feathers and hay
And out on the dandelion meadow the pipit sang all through the day.
Young calves and young lambs in green pastures were full of the frolics of Spring
And joy too had come to the river the song of the dipper did ring
And moorhen was out with her babies and she chirped loud if human was near
Her first lesson to them survival to teach them the meaning of fear.
It's cold in Duhallow this morning the thrush silent on the bare tree
And gray on the fields and the hedgerows and gray over all Knocknagree
But I can remember the bright days when nesting birds piped all the day
And hedgerows and woodlands and meadows smelt sweet with the blossoms of May.
Aug 10, 2010
Aug 10, 2010 at 6:42 PM UTC
My hometown
is a place
of rustic beauty
and simple people
a population
under 200
meant that
everybody knew everybody
farmer Neville
and his sheep
always on the loose
and the quiz night
at the pub
just another excuse
to get drunker and drunker
and the private boarding school
which I attended
so rich with false academia
we learned the lessons
which would prepare us
for the false prophets yet to come
and the public school
and their ***** uniforms
where I found my friends
friends who at this point
have arrest records
ranging from assault
to petty larceny
and criminally wasted potential
oh how I miss that town
even now,
because despite the racism
and xenophobia
which infest my kinsmen
I still have to believe
that things can get better
that life there
can match the beauty
of North Yorkshire farm lands
and woodlands
and friendly knowing smiles
My hometown isn't perfect
and I wouldn't have it
any other way
Apr 21, 2013
Apr 21, 2013 at 3:13 AM UTC
From the woodlands of Madagascar
To the highlands of Ethiopia
Dwell nine species of lovebirds.
Their genus name is Agapornis,
From the Greek agape (love) and ornis (birds).
The French call them Les inséperables
While affection between compatible pairs
Can be a joy to behold,
Lovebirds can be quite territorial
And will defend their nest.
Sexually dimorphic they mate for life.
Like all parrots they need to be well
Socialized and taken care of.
They are very vocal, making loud
High-pitched noises, especially
In the early morning time.
Stocky little birds
With short blunt tails
You can hold them
In the palms of your hands.
They love to snuggle,
They love to preen.
Happy birds: together.
Jul 20, 2014
Jul 20, 2014 at 3:38 PM UTC
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
5.1k
How wonderful it is, I say, to the retreating
yellow form of your feelings I mistook
For Infatuation, you’re a romance heckler
far and far away from
Accepting fruition within classrooms and
being labelled as an angel.
And it was within forbidden hell of
euphoria, I found
You nestled in the society’s psyche
neither content or calling
For help. Neither did you neglect the
pink spectacles of the society,
Even found yourself moulding and moulding
into a fungi green
That I could not recognize, within that
half-sanctum, half-oasis I found you
absentmindedly
Bathing in, you were already out of
its waters.
And I was no longer seeing you within
the dry desert or the sibilance
of my desires, but instead
in cement woodlands and
Within artificial communication and
Intimacy I gave willingly.
Now how does it feel, to have your
heart in one piece,
How does it feel to not use
whipped cream to fill in the
Cracked, salty sections of your
own ***** that,
Out of confusion, continues to
play its favorite song but
in all the wrong beats.
Somehow within cacophony I found
you, nestled, comfortable in
Bogus, fraudulent wings of a former
angel- who now weeps under our
Feet in theory- Somehow, somewhere,
I lost you within an epiphany
That reeked of bliss and pleasure-
Somehow, we end up losing
Twins of the heavens when all is well.
How wonderful.
How wonderful it is, I say, to your
lost, secretly-weeping figure
That I can’t tell whether transparent or
yellow your figure is.
But I keep speaking-
“Oh, how (falsely) wonderful it is-
To love the first angel I’ve set
my eyes upon-
“Oh, how (falsely) wonderful it is-
To lose an angel, no matter how
phoney, to a social heaven.”
- enriko. aug 5. 11:45pm
Aug 5, 2018
Aug 5, 2018 at 12:32 PM UTC
There she awaits-
In her jewelled palace far from faded-eyes
A lily sheltered from the blanket of white;
the air perfume-light from the blossoms,
and a yearning heart -
Lo!
The silver songs of Robins; the heralds of Winters
twirl free.
Lo!
A Hyperborean wind is roused from slumber
and spreads its wings. Leaves drift down are
kissed by frost; lakes, the woodlands placed
under your trance. And your vision came to
be - a polished world on a fair day.
And at a pleasant hour-
Aug 5, 2018
Aug 5, 2018 at 4:47 PM UTC
before that,
we sat pinned
and winded
on steel hands
and plated masks
near the crimson
jade pools
by the killing fields
of bordeaux
we did not look
we could not look
our eyes blinded
and seared
by the charred remains
and shallow graves
the battered birch
and caliginous path
drifters and vagabonds
and kings of kings
held witness
to the pounding
and overkill
the blades
cauldrons
and burning sweet-grass
all brought forth by healers
rammers, sages
and holy front men
glance behind
(watching them sort
through the rubble
and *****
the blood flow
spilling its warmth
throughout the
festering scene
they pulled the stops out
on this one ~
those sweated woodlands
and churned meadows
now framed
by a burned
and broken cross
autumn like winds
begin to chill
(casting spells over ground cover)
night lights flicker
beyond
the fallen trees
Jun 3, 2019
Jun 3, 2019 at 3:58 PM UTC
Rain, softly falls in old deer valley,
All the woodlands swimming underneath
The steaming fog. What peaceful sound
I hear, softly rings out of the sparkling
Woods and meadows, chimes like a thousand
Sleepy bells announcing the rising sun,
Who sings loudest, after the rains.
Jun 11, 2012
Jun 11, 2012 at 10:58 PM UTC
The quiet August noon has come,
A slumberous silence fills the sky,
The fields are still, the woods are dumb,
In glassy sleep the waters lie.
And mark yon soft white clouds that rest
Above our vale, a moveless throng;
The cattle on the mountain's breast
Enjoy the grateful shadow long.
Oh, how unlike those merry hours
In early June when Earth laughs out,
When the fresh winds make love to flowers,
And woodlands sing and waters shout.
When in the grass sweet voices talk,
And strains of tiny music swell
From every moss-cup of the rock,
From every nameless blossom's bell.
But now a joy too deep for sound,
A peace no other season knows,
Hushes the heavens and wraps the ground,
The blessing of supreme repose.
Away! I will not be, to-day,
The only slave of toil and care.
Away from desk and dust! away!
I'll be as idle as the air.
Beneath the open sky abroad,
Among the plants and breathing things,
The sinless, peaceful works of God,
I'll share the calm the season brings.
Come, thou, in whose soft eyes I see
The gentle meanings of thy heart,
One day amid the woods with me,
From men and all their cares apart.
And where, upon the meadow's breast,
The shadow of the thicket lies,
The blue wild flowers thou gatherest
Shall glow yet deeper near thine eyes.
Come, and when mid the calm profound,
I turn, those gentle eyes to seek,
They, like the lovely landscape round,
Of innocence and peace shall speak.
Rest here, beneath the unmoving shade,
And on the silent valleys gaze,
Winding and widening, till they fade
In yon soft ring of summer haze.
The village trees their summits rear
Still as its spire, and yonder flock
At rest in those calm fields appear
As chiselled from the lifeless rock.
One tranquil mount the scene o'erlooks--
There the hushed winds their sabbath keep
While a near hum from bees and brooks
Comes faintly like the breath of sleep.
Well may the gazer deem that when,
Worn with the struggle and the strife,
And heart-sick at the wrongs of men,
The good forsakes the scene of life;
Like this deep quiet that, awhile,
Lingers the lovely landscape o'er,
Shall be the peace whose holy smile
Welcomes him to a happier shore.
4.1k
I want to climb the hillsides
And to see each wondrous view,
And find the peace I long for there
It's all I wish to do,
I want to walk down winding lanes
And to see the lands of green,
And to smell the pretty flowers there
And breathe the air so clean.
I just want to change my world
I need a brand new start,
And leave the strife of city life
A country boy at heart.
I want to cross the meadows
And to see the woodlands grow,
I want to find serenity
Wherever I do go,
I long to see the rivers
And the gently flowing streams,
Which sparkle in the sunlight there
Within a place of dreams.
I just want to change my world
I need a brand new start,
And leave the strife of city life
A country boy at heart.
I want to see the wheat that blows
Within the fields of gold,
I want to find the freedom
And the treasures there untold,
I want to hear the birdsongs
In early morning skies,
And to witness every sunset
And to watch each dawning rise.
I just want to change my world
I need a brand new start,
And leave the strife of city life
A country boy at heart.
Jun 12, 2013
Jun 12, 2013 at 1:22 PM UTC
NOTE - The largest animal in Great Britain, a red stag named Emperor who stood over 9ft tall, was last night shot dead by a trophy hunter. The antlers of the majestic deer are highly prized, and after pictures of the stag appeared in the national press last week, the animal was tracked and killed in Exmoor, Devon.
These mist covered mountains of the highlands,
‘twas here that I once freely wandered upon nature’s pasture grounds,
Now I lie shrouded in the mournful fog of the lowlands,
‘twas here that I was met by a pack of bone breaking hounds.
The fresh dew upon the harvest of autumn’s final flowering,
‘twas here that I chewed the grass of sweet nature’s offering,
Now I grow cold upon the ground where I was stalked by dark doom,
‘twas here that I left life’s rocky way under a hunter’s moon.
The air of the early morn moor with the sky above my dome,
‘twas here that I ran and with joy loved and royally roamed,
Now my legs will nevermore click or clack over my domain fenced with tree gates,
‘twas here that I wooed and won my shy majestic mate.
She, my queen of the green woodlands, she was my wife and my empire,
‘twas here that we romanced in the fading summer’s fire,
Our charming child, my princess of these grassy hills now cloaked in shade,
‘twas here that she saw her father the monarch in death finally fade.
In the chorus of the dancing dawn awakening upon the horizon’s golden rhyme,
‘twas here that I sang the tune that will drum till the end of nature’s time,
They will come with stakes and wood and cross and bow me to the beams,
‘twas here where they hacked and tore off my enchanted crown of weeping dreams.
The scent of the freshly mown grass mingles with the green pine,
‘twas here that I drank the perfume and nectar of the divine,
My eyes glaze, my breathing falters, my clay chills, my soul no more sings,
‘twas here that I finally returned to the hands of my Beloved, the eternal King.
*"...I shall now graze upon the sacred acres of my Creator,
I shall frolic and run free in the tender fields of endless splendour..."*
©Rangzeb Hussain
Oct 27, 2010
Oct 27, 2010 at 3:08 AM UTC
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
3.8k
Welcome Back To This, Your Isle
The rabbits beneath the deck,
Even the pesky deer who eat the shrubbery,
Sea creatures, living and spirits of the dead,
Lying on the paths and in the creeks of Silver Beach,
All inquire:
Was it better wherever you went?
Were the:
Bears, hiding in the forests outside Berlin,
Eagles, double headed, of Russia
Herring, fried, creamed, wined,
From the vendors on the docks of
Helsinki, Riga, Visby and Tallinn,
Salmon, smoked and cured in Stockholm,
More impressive,
Tastier than our striped bass,
Island cohorts of yours, who waited patiently
For their chronicler to return?
Did the Little Mermaid and her Dolphin
Guardians of the Port of Copenhagen
Welcome you more warmly than your friends,
The ospreys, lizards, turtles and owls
Who overwatch your steps and safety
When hiking in Mashomack Preserve?
Are the interlacing tidal creeks,
Woodlands, fields, salt marshes and the ragged,
Irregular but charmed coastline of this cherished island
Any lesser than those of Scandinavia?
Are the sea-going ferries that transverse the
Baltic Sea and the Gulf of Finland,
More poetic than the Menantic or the Lt. Joe,
Who carry you swiftly home to us?
The National Geographic people say that in
Tivoli Gardens, The Amerikaner (ha!) waffle ice cream cone
Is one of the ten best in the world.
Guessing they have not made it yet to the
Tuck Shop for some Moose Tracks!
Were you unaware that our isle settled before
Peter the Great ever envisioned creating the grand
Boulevards of his capitol, St. Petersburg,
Route 114 was a traveled forest path,
By settlers and Indians, not serfs.
Of the Treasures, the Gold Room of the Hermitage,
The Amber Room of Catherine's Palace,
Wrote not a single word, we observe.
Your attentions, they did not deserve?
The answers all, self evident.
Here, surrounded by the gentle breezes of
Long Island Sound and Gardiners Bay,
Sweet and salty flavors of the Peconic atmosphere,
Words unlocked, from your eyes to the page fall,
Smudged by joyous tears, for the muses of the island
Have embraced you yet again and rebirthed
Inspiration, within their comforting, sheltering grasp.
Silver Beach
July 22, 2012
Aug 3, 2013
Aug 3, 2013 at 4:50 PM UTC
My Kite
The view of purplish branches upon the trees and
Looking beyond grassy mountains on the horizon
Bring back memories of my childhood days,
Wading in a nearby creek and flying my kite before a sunlit sky
And then recalling the wind beginning to blow.
Magenta leaves would decorate
Branches of both growing and fallen trees-
Wild geese soared above and deer were running freely
While my kite was carried upward by the wind
As highly as those trees would ever grow.
My kite I believed would carry that mysterious spirit deep inside of me
Into which I had placed all my faith and trust
The tail of my kite seemed to cross the sun, though far above me
I feared the demons’ of the woodlands following me as I walked-
But with strong assurance I pursued my kite wherever it would go.
Dark clouds began to cover the sun one day and
Branches upon the trees were seemingly blackening
While lightening sharply illuminated the sky
I believed a storm was rapidly approaching.
As fright and haunting disbelief inside of my mind began to overshadow. .
I have told others that my kite held within my protective soul which was always with me
Because I saw it to be an angel dancing freely in the sky
I believe my kite held inside the spirit of a seraph,
That saved me from all that betrayed and hurt me
As the voices inside of my mind had often told me so.
Years have passed and that wind was always fierce and deceitful-
Breaking the string with which I held my kite-
I sadly watched it as it flew higher and higher towards the sky
Until it disappeared behind those approaching darkening thunderclouds
Vanishing beyond my sight- leaving me frightened and alone below.
Years have also passed since I lost my kite which I believed was my guiding illumination
People would laugh and say my mind had escaped reality
Now I can see that there is no one to save me from those demons of this planet
I still hide the pain of loss of my spirit of salvation behind laughter and a smile
But that does not erase the void I feel inside and that is an unrelenting sorrow.
Claudia Krizay
Dec 1, 2014
Dec 1, 2014 at 7:19 PM UTC
At evening the autumn woodlands ring
With deadly weapons. Over the golden plains
And lakes of blue, the sun
More darkly rolls. The night surrounds
Warriors dying and the wild lament
Of their fragmented mouths.
Yet silently there gather in the willow combe
Red clouds inhabited by an angry god,
Shed blood, and the chill of the moon.
All roads lead to black decay.
Under golden branching of the night and stars
A sister's shadow sways through the still grove
To greet the heroes' spirits, the bloodied heads.
And softly in the reeds Autumn's dark flutes resound.
O prouder mourning! - You brazen altars,
The spirit's hot flame is fed now by a tremendous pain:
The grandsons, unborn.
3.2k
There's a world outside my little square window
that overlooks fields and woodlands and sunsets
and that world overlooks a bustling avenue with
shutters on windows and constant, humming traffic.
There's a world outside my little square window
that keeps wakes me with the same sun every morning
and the same old singing birds,
and that world rouses me with a different kind of music;
of people and chatter and busking and life.
There's a world outside my little square window,
a world I would never have been tired of exploring,
and that world is named Paris.
Aug 18, 2014
Aug 18, 2014 at 8:59 AM UTC
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes,
Flow gently, I’ll sing thee a song in thy praise;
My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
Thou stock-dove, whose echo resounds thro’ the glen,
Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den,
Thou green-crested lapwing, thy screaming forbear,
I charge you disturb not my slumbering fair.
How lofty, sweet Afton, thy neighbouring hills,
Far mark’d with the courses of clear winding rills;
There daily I wander as noon rises high,
My flocks and my Mary’s sweet cot in my eye.
How pleasant thy banks and green valleys below,
Where wild in the woodlands the primroses blow;
There oft, as mild Ev’ning sweeps over the lea,
The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and me.
Thy crystal stream, Afton, how lovely it glides,
And winds by the cot where my Mary resides,
How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave,
As gathering sweet flowrets she stems thy clear wave.
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes,
Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays;
My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
2.8k
A snowflake is when life and death
Touch lips~not to kiss~
But to breathe unheard words
Into each other's hollowed mouths,
Like a dark, unending woodlands.
Jun 25, 2019
Jun 25, 2019 at 7:26 PM UTC
I once met a viking girl,
who hailed from Norway.
I usually wouldn't have bothered,
but there was something special about her
I couldn't fully grasp.
It was like some weight had been lifted
to relieve my tired body
of it's former failings.
There was a magic she could wield,
some massive dreadnought of power
she kept sheathed in ornate leather.
Sometimes, when she was nervous,
her fingers would brush it's scabbard,
tracing the embossed symbols,
unaware of what she was doing.
And then this longing would overtake her,
leaving her eyes vacant,
momentarily...
As if her vessel had been abandoned
as she expanded
well beyond it's threshold.
During these brief moments
when she'd slip away,
I saw things I couldn't explain.
A furnace of starlight,
encased deep in the Norwegian ice,
alongside the warships of her ancestors.
Usually well-guarded,
out of habit
or necessity.
Before I was consumed entirely
she returned from her reverie,
tearing me away
from that solace.
I wonder now
if she was aware
of what happened.
Those secret woodlands
will haunt me
long after I've gone.
Long after life has left me,
and into the outstretched arms of eternity
and the worlds that follow.
And like some dream,
it still escapes me..
how so much beauty
can be reserved
and contained.
It sickens me to know
that what I'll remember most
was the physical form she'd taken,
and not the things
that truly mattered.
Not the magic she used
to tear me asunder,
wide open and spilling..
helpless in it's radiance.
Not the gentle breeze
that expanded from her wake
as she passed me.
Because it's easier
to be shallow.
It's easier
to forget.
Feb 24, 2015
Feb 24, 2015 at 8:23 AM UTC
Out of the ***** of the Air
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare,
Over the harvest-fields forsaken,
Silent, and soft, and slow
Descends the snow.
Even as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make
In the white countenance confession
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.
This is the poem of the air,
Slowly in silent syllables recorded;
This is the secret of despair,
Long in its cloudy ***** hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.
2.6k
---
A nymph of the woodlands Echo ran
With huntress Dianna
With strength of man
Beautiful creatures
The nymphs were
Attracting Zeus, his heart stirred
Echo had a downfall
In her earthly walk
She had the last word
When she talked
Haughty Hera was Zeus's wife
Jealous women will cause strife
She went looking for her man
But clever Echo had a plan...
She drew the goddess to
Her verbal web
Had the last word to whatever said!
A vengeful god her anger licked
When she found that she was tricked
"You always wanted the last word?
Well, my dear, you
WILL BE HEARD.
*But evermore you'll have a lack
You'll not start conversing...
YOU'LL ANSWER BACK !!!"*
Poor Echo wandered
woodlands fair
In depression and despair
She was deep in love you see
With Narcissus, his great beauty
But she could never talk to him
So she was treated like the wind
Echo with her broken heart
In hills and caves began to haunt
'Til she simply faded away
These places she still haunts today.
As rock and stone she became
Call her, SHE WILL SAY HER NAME.
SoulSurvivor
(C) 7/28/2015
Jul 28, 2015
Jul 28, 2015 at 11:00 PM UTC
In the midst of old ravines and paintings, a succulent soldier dreams.
As dawn starts to paint, as the secondhand piano plays,
his azure iris will gaze
to the sun- the faraway maiden.
In hope that one day, he'd sunbathe and chase dreams
with spring nymphs in holy fields of bonnets and poppies.
Into the poetic imaginations he submerged,
eating dainty buns,saccharine berries and milk by a spiral pond;
and pirouette like butterflies on feathery grass with florets and mist.
Far across the sullen lakes, He'd run with the spring squirrels and foxes;
through the honeyed prairie, the crooned secrets echo faintly like a damsel's song.
In between His spellbinding tales, plants they giggle in harmonious blithe—
that even the gale who gush by in haste, would stop and peer with serene awe.
Abundance of miraculous faith He ignited to his vein,
for the black dots of his crest and spine to someday evanesce.
And in ease, realms of woodlands and lone moors abound upon his eyelids,
that mother nature awaits him.
tick tock, two steps away from the holy born of Christ,
He died of collapsed dream, like muddy landslide of wet monsoon.
His soul— a soul of a fey,beatific and mesmeric dreamer, perish away in stardust.
a shriveled lilac body, graven into a treasure box, a seraphic smile carved.
With waterfalls and chrysanthemums,
moonbeam and fog, an elegy,
and a handful of brimmed ash—the box sealed like a secret letter.
that dusted night
ashes charily scattered to the wide empyrean
along with a brush of vain agony.
Rest in peace, Floyd the cactus.
Dec 25, 2013
Dec 25, 2013 at 7:43 AM UTC
Knows he who tills this lonely field
To reap its scanty corn,
What mystic fruit his acres yield
At midnight and at morn?
In the long sunny afternoon,
The plain was full of ghosts,
I wandered up, I wandered down,
Beset by pensive hosts.
The winding Concord gleamed below,
Pouring as wide a flood
As when my brothers long ago,
Came with me to the wood.
But they are gone,— the holy ones,
Who trod with me this lonely vale,
The strong, star-bright companions
Are silent, low, and pale.
My good, my noble, in their prime,
Who made this world the feast it was,
Who learned with me the lore of time,
Who loved this dwelling-place.
They took this valley for their toy,
They played with it in every mood,
A cell for prayer, a hall for joy,
They treated nature as they would.
They colored the horizon round,
Stars flamed and faded as they bade,
All echoes hearkened for their sound,
They made the woodlands glad or mad.
I touch this flower of silken leaf
Which once our childhood knew
Its soft leaves wound me with a grief
Whose balsam never grew.
Hearken to yon pine warbler
Singing aloft in the tree;
Hearest thou, O traveller!
What he singeth to me?
Not unless God made sharp thine ear
With sorrow such as mine,
Out of that delicate lay couldst thou
The heavy dirge divine.
Go, lonely man, it saith,
They loved thee from their birth,
Their hands were pure, and pure their faith,
There are no such hearts on earth.
Ye drew one mother's milk,
One chamber held ye all;
A very tender history
Did in your childhood fall.
Ye cannot unlock your heart,
The key is gone with them;
The silent ***** loudest chants
The master's requiem.
2.4k
With these eyes
I've watched
woodlands become housing estates
wetland drained
it's wildlife killed
fields plowed by roads
and hedgerows and ancient stones
torn down
and
with these eyes
I've wept
for the village
of
my childhood.
May 16, 2013
May 16, 2013 at 9:32 PM UTC