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- Herausgeber: Delphi Classics
- Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
- Serie: Delphi Poets Series
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015
The Delphi Poets Series offers readers the works of literature's finest poets, with superior formatting. This volume presents the complete poetical works of A. E. Housman, with beautiful illustrations and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1)
* Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Housman's life and works
* Concise introductions to the poetry and other works
* Images of how the poetry books were first printed, giving your eReader a taste of the original texts
* A SHROPSHIRE LAD is presented with line numbers - ideal for students
* Includes rare translations
* Features Housman's comic verse - first time in digital print
* Excellent formatting of the poems
* Special chronological and alphabetical contents tables for the poetry
* Easily locate the poems you want to read
* Housman's rare essays - including seminal critical works and the controversial ëDE AMICITIA', published many years later by the poet's brother, detailing Housman's homosexual love for Jackson
* Scholarly ordering of texts into chronological order and literary genres
Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles
CONTENTS:
The Poetry Collections
A SHROPSHIRE LAD
LAST POEMS
MORE POEMS
ADDITIONAL POEMS
NOTEBOOK FRAGMENTS
TRANSLATIONS
COMIC VERSE
UNCOLLECTED POEMS
The Poems
LIST OF POEMS IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER
LIST OF POEMS IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
The Essays
SWINBURNE
THE NAME AND NATURE OF POETRY
THE APPLICATION OF THOUGHT TO TEXTUAL CRITICISM
A. E. Housman'S ëDE AMICITIA' by Laurence Housman
Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles
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A. E. HOUSMAN
(1859-1936)
Contents
The Poetry Collections
A SHROPSHIRE LAD
LAST POEMS
MORE POEMS
ADDITIONAL POEMS
NOTEBOOK FRAGMENTS
TRANSLATIONS
COMIC VERSE
UNCOLLECTED POEMS
The Poems
LIST OF POEMS IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER
LIST OF POEMS IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
The Essays
SWINBURNE
THE NAME AND NATURE OF POETRY
THE APPLICATION OF THOUGHT TO TEXTUAL CRITICISM
A. E. HOUSMAN’S ‘DE AMICITIA’ by Laurence Housman
© Delphi Classics 2013
Version 1
A. E. HOUSMAN
By Delphi Classics, 2013
NOTE
When reading poetry on an eReader, it is advisable to use a small font size, which will allow the lines of poetry to display correctly.
The Poetry Collections
A. E. Housman was born at Valley House in Fockbury, a hamlet on the outskirts of Bromsgrove in Worcestershire.
Although Housman was born in Valley House, he moved at the age of three months to Perry Hall in the nearby town of Bromsgrove, where his father already had his solicitor’s chambers. Thus, Perry Hall was to become his childhood home.
A plaque commemorating the poet’s residence at Perry Hall
A SHROPSHIRE LAD
A. E. Housman was born in Fockbury, on the outskirts of Bromsgrove in Worcestershire, on 26th March 1859. Tragically, his mother died on his twelfth birthday, and his father, a country solicitor, later married an elder cousin in 1873. Housman was educated first at King Edward’s School, Birmingham, then Bromsgrove School, where he acquired a strong academic grounding and won prizes for his earliest attempts in poetry. In 1877, he won an open scholarship to St John’s College, Oxford, where he went on to study the classics.
Although by nature reserved, perhaps in part due to his homosexuality, Housman formed strong friendships with two roommates, A. W. Pollard and Moses Jackson, the latter becoming the great love of Housman’s life, though Jackson did not return these feelings. Housman obtained a first in classical Moderations in 1879, but his immersion in textual analysis, particularly with Propertius, led him to neglect ancient history and philosophy, which formed part of the Greats curriculum, resulting in him failing to obtain a degree. This failure left him with a deep sense of humiliation and a determination to prove his genius.
After Oxford, Jackson found a position as a clerk in the Patent Office in London and arranged a similar post for Housman. They shared a flat with Jackson’s brother Adalbert until 1885, when Housman moved to lodgings of his own. Jackson moved to India in 1887 and when he returned briefly to England in 1889 to marry, Housman was not invited to the wedding and knew nothing about it until the couple had left the country.
In the meantime, Housman continued pursuing classical studies independently and published scholarly articles on authors such as Horace, Propertius, Ovid, Aeschylus, Euripides and Sophocles. He gradually acquired such a high reputation that in 1892 he was offered the professorship of Latin at University College London, which he accepted. The position at once offered Housman independent financial stability for the first time in his career.
During his years in London, Housman completed what become known as his most famous collection of verses, A Shropshire Lad, a cycle of 63 poems. After several publishers had turned it down, he published the collection at his own expense in 1896. The volume surprised both his colleagues and students. At first the book sold slowly, but during the Second Boer War (1899–1902), Housman’s nostalgic depiction of rural life and the young men’s early deaths struck a chord with English readers and the book became a bestseller. Later, World War I further increased its popularity. Arthur Somervell and other composers were inspired by the folksong-like simplicity of the poems and famous musical settings were composed by George Butterworth and Ralph Vaughan Williams, with others by Ivor Gurney, John Ireland and Ernest John Moeran.
Housman was surprised by the success of the collection due to the deep pessimism and obsession with death he conveys throughout the poems, with no regard given to the consolation of religion. Set in a half-imaginary pastoral Shropshire, “the land of lost content”, the poems explore the fleetingness of love and decay of youth in a spare, uncomplicated style that many critics of the time found outdated as compared to the exuberance of some Romantic poets. Housman himself acknowledged the influence of the songs of William Shakespeare, the Scottish Border ballads and the German Heinrich Heine, but the poet specifically denied any influence of Greek and Latin classics in his work.
The main theme of A Shropshire Lad is mortality and the living of life to its fullest, as death can strike at any time, a theme echoed from Horace’s famous Ode ‘Carpe diem’ which the great classicist would have been more than familiar with. For example, in poem number IV, titled Reveille, the poet urges an unnamed lad to stop sleeping in the daylight, for ‘When the journey’s over/There’ll be time enough to sleep.’
The collection is composed around a series of recurrent themes. It is not a connected narrative, though it can be read as the allegorical narrative of a journey of the heart. The ‘I’ of the poems, the authorial person, is in two cases named as Terence (VIII, LXII), the ‘Shropshire Lad’ of the title. However, the poems are not necessarily all in the same voice and the narrative suggested by the sequence of poems is a general framework, rather than a closely defined linear order.
Moses Jackson, (1858-1923)
Housman as a young man
CONTENTS
I.
From Clee to heaven the beacon burns
II.
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
III.
Leave your home behind, lad
IV.
Wake: the silver dusk returning
V.
Oh see how thick the goldcup flowers
VI.
When the lad for longing sighs
VII.
When smoke stood up from Ludlow
VIII.
Farewell to barn and stack and tree
IX.
On moonlit heath and lonesome bank
X.
The Sun at noon to higher air
XI.
On your midnight pallet lying
XII.
When I watch the living meet
XIII.
When I was one-and-twenty
XIV.
There pass the careless people
XV.
Look not in my eyes, for fear
XVI.
It nods and curtseys and recovers
XVII.
Twice a week the winter thorough
XVIII.
Oh, when I was in love with you
XIX.
The time you won your town the race
XX.
Oh fair enough are sky and plain
XXI.
In summertime on Bredon
XXII.
The street sounds to the soldiers’ tread
XXIII.
The lads in their hundreds
XXIV.
Say, lad, have you things to do
XXV.
This time of year a twelvemonth past
XXVI.
Along the field as we came by
XXVII.
Is my team ploughing
XXVIII.
High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam
XXIX.
’Tis spring; come out to ramble
XXX.
Others, I am not the first
XXXI.
On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble
XXXII.
From far, from eve and morning
XXXIII.
If truth in hearts that perish
XXXIV.
Oh, sick I am to see you
XXXV.
On the idle hill of summer
XXXVI.
White in the moon the long road lies
XXXVII.
As through the wild green hills of Wyre
XXXVIII.
The winds out of the west land blow
XXXIX.
’Tis time, I think, by Wenlock town
XL.
Into my heart on air that kills
XLI.
In my own shire, if I was sad
XLII.
Once in the wind of morning
XLIII.
When I meet the morning beam
XLIV.
Shot? so quick, so clean an ending
XLV.
If it chance your eye offend you
XLVI.
Bring, in this timeless grave to throw
XLVII.
Here the hangman stops his cart
XLVIII.
Be still, my soul, be still
XLIX.
Think no more, lad; laugh, be jolly
L.
In valleys of springs of rivers
LI.
Loitering with a vacant eye
LII.
Far in a western brookland
LIII.
The lad came to the door at night
LIV.
With rue my heart is laden
LV.
Westward on the high-hilled plains
LVI.
Far I hear the bugle blow
LVII.
You smile upon your friend to-day
LVIII.
When I came last to Ludlow
LIX.
The star-filled seas are smooth to-night
LX.
Now hollow fires burn out to black
LXI.
The vane on Hughley steeple
LXII.
Terence, this is stupid stuff
LXIII.
I hoed and trenched and weeded
The first edition
The original title page
Housman had been educated by governesses at home until the age of eleven, when he entered the Bromsgrove School.
I.
From Clee to heaven the beacon burns
1887
FROM Clee to heaven the beacon burns, The shires have seen it plain,From north and south the sign returns And beacons burn again.
Look left, look right, the hills are bright, 5 The dales are light between,Because ’tis fifty years to-night That God has saved the Queen.
Now, when the flame they watch not towers About the soil they trod, 10Lads, we ‘ll remember friends of ours Who shared the work with God.
To skies that knit their heartstrings right, To fields that bred them brave,The saviours come not home to-night 15 Themselves they could not save.
It dawns in Asia, tombstones show And Shropshire names are read;And the Nile spills his overflow Beside the Severn’s dead. 20
We pledge in peace by farm and town The Queen they served in war,And fire the beacons up and down The land they perished for.
‘God save the Queen’ we living sing, 25 From height to height ’tis heard;And with the rest your voices ring, Lads of the Fifty-third.
Oh, God will save her, fear you not: Be you the men you ‘ve been, 30Get you the sons your fathers got,
II.
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
LOVELIEST of trees, the cherry nowIs hung with bloom along the bough,And stands about the woodland rideWearing white for Eastertide.
Now, of my threescore years and ten, 5Twenty will not come again,And take from seventy springs a score,It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloomFifty springs are little room, 10About the woodlands I will goTo see the cherry hung with snow.
III.
Leave your home behind, lad
The Recruit
LEAVE your home behind, lad, And reach your friends your hand,And go, and luck go with you While Ludlow tower shall stand.
Oh, come you home of Sunday 5 When Ludlow streets are stillAnd Ludlow bells are calling To farm and lane and mill,
Or come you home of Monday When Ludlow market hums 10And Ludlow chimes are playing ‘The conquering hero comes,’
Come you home a hero, Or come not home at all,The lads you leave will mind you 15 Till Ludlow tower shall fall.
And you will list the bugle That blows in lands of morn,And make the foes of England Be sorry you were born. 20
And you till trump of doomsday On lands of morn may lie,And make the hearts of comrades Be heavy where you die.
Leave your home behind you, 25 Your friends by field and town:Oh, town and field will mind you
IV.
Wake: the silver dusk returning
Reveille
WAKE: the silver dusk returning Up the beach of darkness brims,And the ship of sunrise burning Strands upon the eastern rims.
Wake: the vaulted shadow shatters, 5 Trampled to the floor it spanned,And the tent of night in tatters Straws the sky-pavilioned land.
Up, lad, up, ’tis late for lying: Hear the drums of morning play; 10Hark, the empty highways crying ‘Who ‘ll beyond the hills away?’
Towns and countries woo together, Forelands beacon, belfries call;Never lad that trod on leather 15 Lived to feast his heart with all.
Up, lad: thews that lie and cumber Sunlit pallets never thrive;Morns abed and daylight slumber Were not meant for man alive. 20
Clay lies still, but blood ‘s a rover; Breath ‘s a ware that will not keep.Up, lad: when the journey ‘s over
V.
Oh see how thick the goldcup flowers
OH see how thick the goldcup flowers Are lying in field and lane,With dandelions to tell the hours That never are told again.Oh may I squire you round the meads 5 And pick you posies gay?— ‘Twill do no harm to take my arm. ‘You may, young man, you may.’
Ah, spring was sent for lass and lad, ’Tis now the blood runs gold, 10And man and maid had best be glad Before the world is old.What flowers to-day may flower to-morrow, But never as good as new. — Suppose I wound my arm right round — 15 ‘’Tis true, young man, ’tis true.’
Some lads there are, ’tis shame to say, That only court to thieve,And once they bear the bloom away ’Tis little enough they leave. 20Then keep your heart for men like me And safe from trustless chaps.My love is true and all for you. ‘Perhaps, young man, perhaps.’
Oh, look in my eyes then, can you doubt? 25 — Why, ’tis a mile from town.How green the grass is all about! We might as well sit down. — Ah, life, what is it but a flower? Why must true lovers sigh? 30Be kind, have pity, my own, my pretty, — ‘Good-bye, young man, good-bye.’
VI.
When the lad for longing sighs
WHEN the lad for longing sighs, Mute and dull of cheer and pale,If at death’s own door he lies, Maiden, you can heal his ail.
Lovers’ ills are all to buy: 5 The wan look, the hollow tone,The hung head, the sunken eye, You can have them for your own.
Buy them, buy them: eve and morn Lovers’ ills are all to sell. 10Then you can lie down forlorn;
VII.
When smoke stood up from Ludlow
WHEN smoke stood up from Ludlow, And mist blew off from Teme,And blithe afield to ploughing Against the morning beamI strode beside my team, 5
The blackbird in the coppice Looked out to see me stride,And hearkened as I whistled The trampling team beside, And fluted and replied: 10
‘Lie down, lie down, young yeoman; What use to rise and rise?Rise man a thousand mornings Yet down at last he lies, And then the man is wise.’ 15
I heard the tune he sang me, And spied his yellow bill;I picked a stone and aimed it And threw it with a will: Then the bird was still. 20
Then my soul within me Took up the blackbird’s strain,And still beside the horses Along the dewy lane It sang the song again: 25
‘Lie down, lie down, young yeoman; The sun moves always west;The road one treads to labour Will lead one home to rest, And that will be the best.’ 30
VIII.
Farewell to barn and stack and tree
‘FAREWELL to barn and stack and tree, Farewell to Severn shore.Terence, look your last at me, For I come home no more.
‘The sun burns on the half-mown hill, 5 By now the blood is dried;And Maurice amongst the hay lies still And my knife is in his side.
‘My mother thinks us long away; ’Tis time the field were mown. 10She had two sons at rising day, To-night she ‘ll be alone.
‘And here ‘s a bloody hand to shake, And oh, man, here ‘s good-bye;We ‘ll sweat no more on scythe and rake, 15 My bloody hands and I.
‘I wish you strength to bring you pride, And a love to keep you clean,And I wish you luck, come Lammastide, At racing on the green. 20
‘Long for me the rick will wait, And long will wait the fold,And long will stand the empty plate, And dinner will be cold.’
IX.
On moonlit heath and lonesome bank
ON moonlit heath and lonesome bank The sheep beside me graze;And yon the gallows used to clank Fast by the four cross ways.
A careless shepherd once would keep 5 The flocks by moonlight there,And high amongst the glimmering sheep The dead man stood on air.
They hang us now in Shrewsbury jail: The whistles blow forlorn, 10And trains all night groan on the rail To men that die at morn.
There sleeps in Shrewsbury jail to-night, Or wakes, as may betide,A better lad, if things went right, 15 Than most that sleep outside.
And naked to the hangman’s noose The morning clocks will ringA neck God made for other use Than strangling in a string. 20
And sharp the link of life will snap, And dead on air will standHeels that held up as straight a chap As treads upon the land.
So here I ‘ll watch the night and wait 25 To see the morning shine,When he will hear the stroke of eight And not the stroke of nine;
And wish my friend as sound a sleep As lads’ I did not know, 30That shepherded the moonlit sheep A hundred years ago.
X.
The Sun at noon to higher air
March
THE SUN at noon to higher air,Unharnessing the silver PairThat late before his chariot swam,Rides on the gold wool of the Ram.
So braver notes the storm-cock sings 5To start the rusted wheel of things,And brutes in field and brutes in penLeap that the world goes round again.
The boys are up the woods with dayTo fetch the daffodils away, 10And home at noonday from the hillsThey bring no dearth of daffodils.
Afield for palms the girls repair,And sure enough the palms are there,And each will find by hedge or pond 15Her waving silver-tufted wand.
In farm and field through all the shireThe eye beholds the heart’s desire;Ah, let not only mine be vain,
XI.
On your midnight pallet lying
ON your midnight pallet lying, Listen, and undo the door:Lads that waste the light in sighing In the dark should sigh no more;Night should ease a lover’s sorrow; 5Therefore, since I go to-morrow, Pity me before.
In the land to which I travel, The far dwelling, let me say — Once, if here the couch is gravel, 10 In a kinder bed I lay,And the breast the darnel smothersRested once upon another’s When it was not clay.
XII.
When I watch the living meet
WHEN I watch the living meet, And the moving pageant fileWarm and breathing through the street Where I lodge a little while,
If the heats of hate and lust 5 In the house of flesh are strong,Let me mind the house of dust Where my sojourn shall be long.
In the nation that is not Nothing stands that stood before; 10There revenges are forgot, And the hater hates no more;
Lovers lying two and two Ask not whom they sleep beside,And the bridegroom all night through 15 Never turns him to the bride.
XIII.
When I was one-and-twenty
WHEN I was one-and-twenty I heard a wise man say,‘Give crowns and pounds and guineas But not your heart away;
Give pearls away and rubies 5 But keep your fancy free.’But I was one-and-twenty, No use to talk to me.
When I was one-and-twenty I heard him say again, 10‘The heart out of the bosom Was never given in vain;’Tis paid with sighs a plenty And sold for endless rue.’And I am two-and-twenty, 15 And oh, ’tis true, ’tis true.
XIV.
There pass the careless people
THERE pass the careless people That call their souls their own:Here by the road I loiter, How idle and alone.
Ah, past the plunge of plummet, 5 In seas I cannot sound,My heart and soul and senses, World without end, are drowned.
His folly has not fellow Beneath the blue of day 10That gives to man or woman His heart and soul away.
There flowers no balm to sain him From east of earth to westThat ‘s lost for everlasting 15 The heart out of his breast.
Here by the labouring highway With empty hands I stroll:Sea-deep, till doomsday morning, Lie lost my heart and soul. 20
XV.
Look not in my eyes, for fear
LOOK not in my eyes, for fear Thy mirror true the sight I see,And there you find your face too clear And love it and be lost like me.One the long nights through must lie 5 Spent in star-defeated sighs,But why should you as well as I Perish? gaze not in my eyes.
A Grecian lad, as I hear tell, One that many loved in vain, 10Looked into a forest well And never looked away again.There, when the turf in springtime flowers, With downward eye and gazes sad,Stands amid the glancing showers 15 A jonquil, not a Grecian lad.
XVI.
It nods and curtseys and recovers
IT nods and curtseys and recovers When the wind blows above,The nettle on the graves of lovers That hanged themselves for love.
The nettle nods, the winds blows over, 5 The man, he does not move,The lover of the grave, the lover That hanged himself for love.
XVII.
Twice a week the winter thorough
TWICE a week the winter thorough Here stood I to keep the goal:Football then was fighting sorrow For the young man’s soul.
Now in Maytime to the wicket 5 Out I march with bat and pad:See the son of grief at cricket Trying to be glad.
Try I will; no harm in trying: Wonder ’tis how little mirth 10Keeps the bones of man from lying On the bed of earth.
XVIII.
Oh, when I was in love with you
OH, when I was in love with you, Then I was clean and brave,And miles around the wonder grew How well did I behave.
And now the fancy passes by, 5 And nothing will remain,And miles around they ‘ll say that I Am quite myself again.
XIX.
The time you won your town the race
To an Athlete Dying Young
THE TIME you won your town the raceWe chaired you through the market-place;Man and boy stood cheering by,And home we brought you shoulder-high.
To-day, the road all runners come, 5Shoulder-high we bring you home,And set you at your threshold down,Townsman of a stiller town.
Smart lad, to slip betimes awayFrom fields where glory does not stay 10And early though the laurel growsIt withers quicker than the rose.
Eyes the shady night has shutCannot see the record cut,And silence sounds no worse than cheers 15After earth has stopped the ears:
Now you will not swell the routOf lads that wore their honours out,Runners whom renown outranAnd the name died before the man. 20
So set, before its echoes fade,The fleet foot on the sill of shade,And hold to the low lintel upThe still-defended challenge-cup.
And round that early-laurelled head 25Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,And find unwithered on its curls
XX.
Oh fair enough are sky and plain
OH fair enough are sky and plain, But I know fairer far:Those are as beautiful again That in the water are;
The pools and rivers wash so clean 5 The trees and clouds and air,The like on earth was never seen, And oh that I were there.
These are the thoughts I often think As I stand gazing down 10In act upon the cressy brink To strip and dive and drown;
But in the golden-sanded brooks And azure meres I spyA silly lad that longs and looks 15 And wishes he were I.
XXI.
In summertime on Bredon
Bredon Hill
IN summertime on Bredon The bells they sound so clear;Round both the shires they ring them In steeples far and near, A happy noise to hear. 5
Here of a Sunday morning My love and I would lie,And see the coloured counties, And hear the larks so high About us in the sky. 10
The bells would ring to call her In valleys miles away:‘Come all to church, good people; Good people, come and pray.’ But here my love would stay. 15
And I would turn and answer Among the springing thyme,‘Oh, peal upon our wedding, And we will hear the chime, And come to church in time.’ 20
But when the snows at Christmas On Bredon top were strown,My love rose up so early And stole out unbeknown And went to church alone. 25
They tolled the one bell only, Groom there was none to see,The mourners followed after, And so to church went she, And would not wait for me. 30
The bells they sound on Bredon, And still the steeples hum.‘Come all to church, good people,’ — Oh, noisy bells, be dumb; I hear you, I will come.
XXII.
The street sounds to the soldiers’ tread
THE STREET sounds to the soldiers’ tread, And out we troop to see:A single redcoat turns his head, He turns and looks at me.
My man, from sky to sky’s so far, 5 We never crossed before;Such leagues apart the world’s ends are, We ‘re like to meet no more;
What thoughts at heart have you and I We cannot stop to tell; 10But dead or living, drunk or dry, Soldier, I wish you well.
XXIII.
The lads in their hundreds
THE LADS in their hundreds to Ludlow come in for the fair, There’s men from the barn and the forge and the mill and the fold,The lads for the girls and the lads for the liquor are there, And there with the rest are the lads that will never be old.
There’s chaps from the town and the field and the till and the cart, 5 And many to count are the stalwart, and many the brave,And many the handsome of face and the handsome of heart, And few that will carry their looks or their truth to the grave.
I wish one could know them, I wish there were tokens to tell The fortunate fellows that now you can never discern; 10And then one could talk with them friendly and wish them farewell And watch them depart on the way that they will not return.
But now you may stare as you like and there’s nothing to scan; And brushing your elbow unguessed-at and not to be toldThey carry back bright to the coiner the mintage of man, 15 The lads that will die in their glory and never be old.
XXIV.
Say, lad, have you things to do
SAY, lad, have you things to do? Quick then, while your day’s at primeQuick, and if ’tis work for two, Here am I, man: now’s your time
Send me now, and I shall go; 5 Call me, I shall hear you call;Use me ere they lay me low Where a man’s no use at all;
Ere the wholesome flesh decay, And the willing nerve be numb, 10And the lips lack breath to say, ‘No, my lad, I cannot come.’
XXV.
This time of year a twelvemonth past
THIS time of year a twelvemonth past, When Fred and I would meet,We needs must jangle, till at last We fought and I was beat.
So then the summer fields about, 5 Till rainy days began,Rose Harland on her Sundays out Walked with the better man.
The better man she walks with still, Though now ’tis not with Fred: 10A lad that lives and has his will Is worth a dozen dead.
Fred keeps the house all kinds of weather, And clay’s the house he keeps;When Rose and I walk out together 15 Stock-still lies Fred and sleeps.
XXVI.
Along the field as we came by
ALONG the field as we came byA year ago, my love and I,The aspen over stile and stoneWas talking to itself alone.‘Oh who are these that kiss and pass? 5A country lover and his lass;Two lovers looking to be wed;And time shall put them both to bed,But she shall lie with earth above,And he beside another love.’ 10
And sure enough beneath the treeThere walks another love with me,And overhead the aspen heavesIts rainy-sounding silver leaves;And I spell nothing in their stir, 15But now perhaps they speak to her,And plain for her to understandThey talk about a time at handWhen I shall sleep with clover clad,And she beside another lad. 20
XXVII.
Is my team ploughing
‘IS my team ploughing, That I was used to driveAnd hear the harness jingle When I was man alive?’
Ay, the horses trample, 5 The harness jingles now;No change though you lie under The land you used to plough.
‘Is football playing Along the river shore, 10With lads to chase the leather, Now I stand up no more?’
Ay, the ball is flying, The lads play heart and soul;The goal stands up, the keeper 15 Stands up to keep the goal.
‘Is my girl happy, That I thought hard to leave,And has she tired of weeping As she lies down at eve?’ 20
Ay, she lies down lightly, She lies not down to weep:Your girl is well contented. Be still, my lad, and sleep.
‘Is my friend hearty, 25 Now I am thin and pine,And has he found to sleep in A better bed than mine?’
Yes, lad, I lie easy, I lie as lads would choose; 30I cheer a dead man’s sweetheart, Never ask me whose.
XXVIII.
High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam
The Welsh Marches
HIGH the vanes of Shrewsbury gleamIslanded in Severn stream;The bridges from the steepled crestCross the water east and west.
The flag of morn in conqueror’s state 5Enters at the English gate:The vanquished eve, as night prevails,Bleeds upon the road to Wales.
Ages since the vanquished bledRound my mother’s marriage-bed; 10There the ravens feasted farAbout the open house of war:
When Severn down to Buildwas ranColoured with the death of man,Couched upon her brother’s grave 15The Saxon got me on the slave.
The sound of fight is silent longThat began the ancient wrong;Long the voice of tears is stillThat wept of old the endless ill. 20
In my heart it has not died,The war that sleeps on Severn side;They cease not fighting, east and west,On the marches of my breast.
Here the truceless armies yet 25Trample, rolled in blood and sweat,They kill and kill and never die;And I think that each is I.
None will part us, none undoThe knot that makes one flesh of two, 30Sick with hatred, sick with pain,Strangling — When shall we be slain?
When shall I be dead and ridOf the wrong my father did?How long, how long, till spade and hearse 35
XXIX.
’Tis spring; come out to ramble
The Lent Lily
‘TIS spring; come out to ramble The hilly brakes around,For under thorn and bramble About the hollow ground The primroses are found. 5
And there’s the windflower chilly With all the winds at play,And there’s the Lenten lily That has not long to stay And dies on Easter day. 10
And since till girls go maying You find the primrose still,And find the windflower playing With every wind at will, But not the daffodil, 15
Bring baskets now, and sally Upon the spring’s array,And bear from hill and valley The daffodil away
XXX.
Others, I am not the first
OTHERS, I am not the first,Have willed more mischief than they durst:If in the breathless night I tooShiver now, ’tis nothing new.
More than I, if truth were told, 5Have stood and sweated hot and cold,And through their reins in ice and fireFear contended with desire.
Agued once like me were they,But I like them shall win my way 10Lastly to the bed of mouldWhere there’s neither heat nor cold.
But from my grave across my browPlays no wind of healing now,And fire and ice within me fight 15Beneath the suffocating night.
XXXI.
On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble
ON Wenlock Edge the wood’s in troubleHis forest fleece the Wrekin heaves;The gale, it plies the saplings double,And thick on Severn snow the leaves.
‘Twould blow like this through holt and hanger 5When Uricon the city stood:’Tis the old wind in the old anger,But then it threshed another wood.
Then, ’twas before my time, the RomanAt yonder heaving hill would stare: 10The blood that warms an English yeoman,The thoughts that hurt him, they were there.
There, like the wind through woods in riot,Through him the gale of life blew high;The tree of man was never quiet: 15Then ’twas the Roman, now ’tis I.
The gale, it plies the saplings double,It blows so hard, ‘twill soon be gone:To-day the Roman and his trouble
XXXII.
From far, from eve and morning
FROM far, from eve and morning And yon twelve-winded sky,The stuff of life to knit me Blew hither: here am I.
Now — for a breath I tarry 5 Nor yet disperse apart — Take my hand quick and tell me, What have you in your heart.
Speak now, and I will answer; How shall I help you, say; 10Ere to the wind’s twelve quarters I take my endless way.
XXXIII.
If truth in hearts that perish
IF truth in hearts that perish Could move the powers on high,I think the love I bear you Should make you not to die.
Sure, sure, if stedfast meaning, 5 If single thought could save,The world might end to-morrow, You should not see the grave.
This long and sure-set liking, This boundless will to please, 10 — Oh, you should live for ever If there were help in these.
But now, since all is idle, To this lost heart be kind,Ere to a town you journey 15 Where friends are ill to find.
XXXIV.
Oh, sick I am to see you
The New Mistress
‘OH, sick I am to see you, will you never let me be?You may be good for something but you are not good for me.Oh, go where you are wanted, for you are not wanted here.
