On the Idle Hill of Summer

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1. Eulogy To A Hell Of A Dame some dogs who sleep ay night Must dream of bones And I remember your bones In flesh And best In that dark green dress And those high-heeled bright Black shoes, You always cursed when you drank, Your hair coimng down you Wanted to explode out of What was holding you: Rotten memories of a Rotten […]...
2. The Carpenter's Son “Here the hangman stops his cart: Now the best of friends must part. Fare you well, for ill fare I: Live, lads, and I will die. “Oh, at home had I but stayed ‘Prenticed to my father’s trade, Had I stuck to plane and adze, I had not been lost, my lads. “Then I might […]...
3. I Hoed and Trenched and Weeded I hoed and trenched and weeded, And took the flowers to fair: I brought them home unheeded; The hue was not the wear. So up and down I sow them For lads like me to find, When I shall lie below them, A dead man out of mind. Some seed the birds devour, And some […]...
4. The Princess: A Medley: Tears, Idle Tears Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some divine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy Autumn-fields, And thinking of the days that are no more. Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, That brings our friends up […]...
5. All Lovely Things All lovely things will have an ending, All lovely things will fade and die, And youth, that’s now so bravely spending, Will beg a penny by and by. Fine ladies soon are all forgotten, And goldenrod is dust when dead, The sweetest flesh and flowers are rotten And cobwebs tent the brightest head. Come back, […]...
6. Walking on the Estuary Hill The curlew and the heron call, The hissing mud and whispering wings Beat eery through the idle air Until the moonlit midnight silence falls And then the tide flows softly Through the gut and sluice of estuary sands And dark against the dreamlit sky The trees arise from hedgerows, And the hills Alive with monstrous […]...
7. 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 […]...
8. Tears, Idle Tears Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some divine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy autumn-fields, And thinking of the days that are no more. Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, That brings our friends up […]...
9. The Hill Maples Here on a hill of the occident stand we shoulder to shoulder, Comrades tried and true through a mighty swath of the years! Spring harps glad laughter through us, and ministrant rains of the autumn Sing us again the songs of ancient dolor and tears. The glory of sunrise smites on our fair, free brows […]...
10. The Winds Out of the West Land Blow The winds out of the west land blow, My friends have breathed them there; Warm with the blood of lads I know Comes east the sighing air. It fanned their temples, filled their lungs, Scattered their forelocks free; My friends made words of it with tongues That talk no more to me. Their voices, dying […]...
11. Fern Hill Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green, The night above the dingle starry, Time let me hail and climb Golden in the heydays of his eyes, And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns And once below […]...
12. The Summer Day Who made the world? Who made the swan, and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper? This grasshopper, I mean The one who has flung herself out of the grass, The one who is eating sugar out of my hand, Who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down Who is […]...
13. Tis the Last Rose of Summer Tis the last rose of summer Left blooming alone; All her lovely companions Are faded and gone: No flower of her kindred, No rose-bud is nigh, To reflect back her blushes, Or give sigh for sigh. I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one! To pine on the stem; Since the lovely are sleeping, Go, sleep […]...
14. My Mother On An Evening In Late Summer 1 When the moon appears And a few wind-stricken barns stand out In the low-domed hills And shine with a light That is veiled and dust-filled And that floats upon the fields, My mother, with her hair in a bun, Her face in shadow, and the smoke From their cigarette coiling close To the faint […]...
15. Exhortation: Summer 1919 Through the pregnant universe rumbles life’s terrific thunder, And Earth’s bowels quake with terror; strange and terrible storms break, Lightning-torches flame the heavens, kindling souls of men, thereunder: Africa! long ages sleeping, O my motherland, awake! In the East the clouds glow crimson with the new dawn that is breaking, And its golden glory fills […]...
16. Heroes This war’s dead heroes, who has seen them? They rise in smoke above the burning city, Faint clouds, dissolving into sky – And who sifting the Libyan sand can find The tracery of a human hand, The faint impression of an absent mind, The fade-out of a soldier’s day dream? You’ll know your love no […]...
17. ON THE DIVAN HE who knows himself and others Here will also see, That the East and West, like brothers, Parted ne’er shall be. Thoughtfully to float for ever ‘Tween two worlds, be man’s endeavour! So between the East and West To revolve, be my behest! 1833.*...
18. Indian Summer A soft veil dims the tender skies, And half conceals from pensive eyes The bronzing tokens of the fall; A calmness broods upon the hills, And summer’s parting dream distills A charm of silence over all. The stacks of corn, in brown array, Stand waiting through the placid day, Like tattered wigwams on the plain; […]...
19. The Welsh Marches High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam Islanded in Severn stream; The bridges from the steepled crest Cross the water east and west. The flag of morn in conqueror’s state Enters at the English gate: The vanquished eve, as night prevails, Bleeds upon the road to Wales. Ages since the vanquished bled Round my mother’s marriage-bed; […]...
20. A Summer Afternoon A languid atmosphere, a lazy breeze, With labored respiration, moves the wheat From distant reaches, till the golden seas Break in crisp whispers at my feet. My book, neglected of an idle mind, Hides for a moment from the eyes of men; Or lightly opened by a critic wind, Affrightedly reviews itself again. Off through […]...
21. The New Ezekiel What, can these dead bones live, whose sap is dried By twenty scorching centuries of wrong? Is this the House of Israel, whose pride Is as a tale that’s told, an ancient song? Are these ignoble relics all that live Of psalmist, priest, and prophet? Can the breath Of very heaven bid these bones revive, […]...
22. A Song 1 COME, I will make the continent indissoluble; I will make the most splendid race the sun ever yet shone upon; I will make divine magnetic lands, With the love of comrades, With the life-long love of comrades. 2 I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America, and along the […]...
23. Malvern Hill Ye elms that wave on Malvern Hill In prime of morn and May, Recall ye how McClellan’s men Here stood at bay? While deep within yon forest dim Our rigid comrades lay – Some with the cartridge in their mouth, Others with fixed arms lifted South – Invoking so The cypress glades? Ah wilds of […]...
24. Mesopotamia 1917 They shall not return to us, the resolute, the young, The eager and whole-hearted whom we gave: But the men who left them thriftily to die in their own dung, Shall they come with years and honour to the grave? They shall not return to us; the strong men coldly slain In sight of […]...
25. Under the Shadow of Kiley's Hill This is the place where they all were bred; Some of the rafters are standing still; Now they are scattered and lost and dead, Every one from the old nest fled, Out of the shadow of Kiley’s Hill. Better it is that they ne’er came back Changes and chances are quickly rung; Now the old […]...
26. The Hill Breathless, we flung us on the windy hill, Laughed in the sun, and kissed the lovely grass. You said “Through glory and ecstasy we pass; Wind, sun, and earth remain, and birds sing still, When we are old, are old….” “And when we die All’s over that is ours; and life burns on Through other […]...
27. 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 When Ludlow streets are still And Ludlow bells are calling To farm and lane and mill, Or come you home of Monday When Ludlow market hums […]...
28. A Ballad of Jakkko Hill One moment bid the horses wait, Since tiffin is not laid till three, Below the upward path and straight You climbed a year ago with me. Love came upon us suddenly And loosed an idle hour to kill A headless, armless armory That smote us both on Jakko Hill. Ah Heaven! we would wait and […]...
29. The Hill Wife I. LONELINESS Her Word One ought not to have to care So much as you and I Care when the birds come round the house To seem to say good-bye; Or care so much when they come back With whatever it is they sing; The truth being we are as much Too glad for the […]...
30. Aftermath Have you forgotten yet?… For the world’s events have rumbled on since those gagged days, Like traffic checked while at the crossing of city-ways: And the haunted gap in your mind has filled with thoughts that flow Like clouds in the lit heaven of life; and you’re a man reprieved to go, Taking your peaceful […]...
31. 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, 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 That gives […]...
32. 233. Song-O were I on Parnassus Hill O, WERE I on Parnassus hill, Or had o’ Helicon my fill, That I might catch poetic skill, To sing how dear I love thee! But Nith maun be my Muse’s well, My Muse maun be thy bonie sel’, On Corsincon I’ll glowr and spell, And write how dear I love thee. Then come, sweet […]...
33. Rain on the Hill Now on the hill The fitful wind is so still That never a wimpling mist uplifts, Nor a trembling leaf drop-laden stirs; From the ancient firs Aroma of balsam drifts, And the silent places are filled With elusive odors distilled By the rain from asters empearled and frilled, And a wild wet savor that dwells […]...
34. Written On A Summer Evening The church bells toll a melancholy round, Calling the people to some other prayers, Some other gloominess, more dreadful cares, More harkening to the sermon’s horrid sound. Surely the mind of man is closely bound In some blind spell: seeing that each one tears Himself from fireside joys and Lydian airs, And converse high of […]...
35. 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, The dales are light between, Because ’tis fifty years to-night That God has saved the Queen. Now, when the flame they watch not […]...
36. The Fury Of Beautiful Bones Sing me a thrush, bone. Sing me a nest of cup and pestle. Sing me a sweetbread fr an old grandfather. Sing me a foot and a doorknob, for you are my love. Oh sing, bone bag man, sing. Your head is what I remember that Augusty You were in love with another woman but […]...
37. Is My Team Ploughing “Is my team ploughing, That I was used to drive And hear the harness jingle When I was man alive?” Ay, the horses trample, The harness jingles now; No change though you lie under The land you used to plough. “Is football playing Along the river shore, With lads to chase the leather, Now I […]...
38. St. Martin's Summer AS swallows turning backward When half-way o’er the sea, At one word’s trumpet summons They came again to me – The hopes I had forgotten Came back again to me. I know not which to credit, O lady of my heart! Your eyes that bade me linger, Your words that bade us part – I […]...
39. As Summer into Autumn slips As Summer into Autumn slips And yet we sooner say “The Summer” than “the Autumn,” lest We turn the sun away, And almost count it an Affront The presence to concede Of one however lovely, not The one that we have loved So we evade the charge of Years On one attempting shy The Circumvention […]...
40. A something in a summer's Day A something in a summer’s Day As slow her flambeaux burn away Which solemnizes me. A something in a summer’s noon A depth an Azure a perfume Transcending ecstasy. And still within a summer’s night A something so transporting bright I clap my hands to see Then veil my too inspecting face Lets such a […]...