Lovely things

They are such lovely things
And make the very seasons where they come
The nightingale is smothered where she sings
Above their scented bloom
O what delight the cuckoo music brings
I love wild flowers

#photography #poetry #environment

Image by my friend #CarryAkroyd

Joy or despair

Peggy ye might bin my death wi yer scorning 

Im sure tis yer pleasure to do as ye may 

For ere sin I helpd ye to milk in the morning 

Yeve 'ployd all my thoughts for the rest of the day 

Yer sweet slender body so light & so jimping 

Yer arms so well shapd & yer brown curley hair 

Yer gait so belady like spoilt wi no limping 

Left ye the power to gi joy or despair 

(from Hodges Confession)

#photography #poetry #environment

Sweet Mary

How could I how should I — that loved her so early
Forget when I've sung of her beauty in song
How could I forget what I've worshiped so dearly
From boyhood to manhood and all my life long
As leaves to the branches in summer comes daily
& blossoms will bloom on the stalk & the tree
To her beauty I'll cling & i'll love her as truly
& think of sweet Mary wherever I be

#photography #poetry #environment

The photo is of Glinton Church where Mary was buried 3 years before Clare wrote the poem.

The nettle

Tall grows the nettle by the hedgeway side

& bye the old barn end they shade the wall
In sunshine nodding to the angry tide
Of winds that winnows bye—these one & all
Makes up the harmony of Spring—& all
That passes feel a sudden love for flowers
They look so green—& when the soft showers fall
They grow so fast—Dock Burdocks Henbane—all
Who loves not wild flowers bye the old stone wall

#photography #poetry #environment

The dew falls

The Dew falls on the weed & on the flower
The rose & thistle bathe their heads in dew
The lowliest heart may have its prospering hour
The saddest bosom meet its wishes true
E'en I may joy love happiness renew
Though not the sweets of my first early days
When one sweet face was all the loves I knew
& my soul trembled on her eyes to gaze
Whose very censure seemed intended praise

#photography #poetry #environment

Our footsteps

To sip of the dew the worm pep[t] from his den

But dreading our footsteps soon vanishd agen

& numbers of creatures apeard in our sight

That live in the silence & sweetness of night

Climbing up the tall grasses or scaling the bough

But these were all namless unoticd till now

& we listnd well pleasd at the guggles & groans

The water made passing the pebbles & stones

& then we turnd up by the rut rifted lane

& sought for our cot & the village again

#photography #poetry #environment

Like gold minted new

I see the wild flowers in their summer morn
Of beauty feeding on joys luscious hours
The gay convolvulus wreathing round the thorn
Agape for honey showers
& slender kingcup burnished with the dew
Of mornings early hours
Like gold minted new

#photography #poetry #environment

Image : detail from my wildflower meadow

Old Heath

I love to see the old heaths withered brake
Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze & ling

I love to see the old heaths withered brake
Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze & ling
While the old heron from the lonely lake
Starts slow & flaps his melancholy wing
& oddling crow in idle motions swing
The fieldfares chatter in the whistling thorn
& for the awe round fields & closen rove

& coy bumbarrels twenty in a drove
Flit down the hedgerows in the frozen plain
& hang on little twigs & start again

#photography #poetry #environment 

The Wren

#photography #poetry #environment

The Fatherless

The Orphans grief & sorrow so severe
To every heart in pitys language speak
E'en the rough sexton cant withhold the tear
That steals unnoticd down his furrowd cheek

Who but is grievd to see the Fatherless
Stroll with their rags unnoticd through the street
What eye but moistens at their sad distress
& sheds compassions tear whene'er they meet

#photography #poetry #environment

Rut-rifted lane

The cockchafer hums down the rut-rifted lane
Where the wild roses hang & the woodbines entwine
& the shrill squeaking bat makes his circles again
Round the side of the tavern close by the sign
The sun is gone down like a wearisome queen
In curtains the richest that ever were seen

#photography #poetry #environment

In sweet delight

Sweet bottle shaped flower of lushy red
Born when the summer wakes her warmest breeze
Among the meadows waving grasses spread
Or neath the shade of hedge or clumping trees
Bowing on slender stem thy heavy head
In sweet delight I view thy summer bed
& hark the drone of heavy humble bees
Along thy honeed garden gailey led
Down corn field striped balks & pasture leas—
Fond warmings of the soul that long has fled

#photography #poetry #environment

Wild hedge rose

I wish I was the wild woodbine

Twining round the white thorn bough
I wish I was the wild hedge rose
Upon thy bonny bosom now
To feel thy thumb and finger nip
About my twisted stem
The flowers now toutch thy ruby lip
To kiss their mornings gem

My flowers would kiss those lips o' thine
That kiss'd the dewdrops made divine

#photography #poetry #environment

Charm in nature

There is a charm in nature felt and seen
In every season of the varied year
In winters frost in springs reviving green
        'Tis every where

In foreign lands how beautiful the sight
Over a thousand mountains of snow sprey
With nought of green—but mountains pale as light
        And all the way

The springs green herbage full of flowers
And fields where lives the lark mid greener grain
We love and worship them in April hours
        Then wish again

 

#photography #poetry #environment

All nature

All nature has a feeling wood fields brooks

Are life eternal—& in silence they

Speak happiness—beyond the reach of books

There's nothing mortal in them—their decay

Is the green life of change to pass away

& come again in blooms revifified

Its birth was heaven eternal is its stay

& with the sun & moon shall still abide

Beneath their night & day & heave[n] wide

 

#photography #poetry #environment 

Towers of heaven

Some shaped like boats their placid track pursue

Oer gentle billows of a different hue

Soft as the paper ships they often make

& float on curdling brook or meadow lake

Some white like palaces of marble seems

The towers of heaven they’re called in dreams

& which his waking fancys grandly shine
The abodes of one that instant suns divine

 

#photography #poetry #environment

The droning bee

The droning bee has wakened up

& humming round the buttercup

& round the bright star daisy hums—

O'er every blade of grass he passes—

The dewdrop shines like looking glasses

In every drop a bright sun comes—

'Tis march & spring bright days we see—

Round every blossom hums the bee

 

#photography #poetry #environment

Natures adorning

Sweet comes the morning In natures adorning

& bright shines the dew on the buds o the thorn

Where Mary Ann rambles

Through sloe trees & brambles

Shes sweeter than wild flowers that open at morn

Shes a rose i' the dew love

Nothings sweeter than true love

Shes as gay as the poppy that grows in the corn

 

Images by my friend #CarryAkroyd

#photography #poetry #environment

Insects strangers

The ruddy child nursed in the lap of care
In toils rude strife to do his little share
Beside his mother poddles oer the land
Sun burnt and stooping with a weary hand
Picking his tiney glean of corn or wheat
While crackling stubbles wound his little feet
Full glad he often is to sit awhile
Upon a smooth green baulk to ease his toil
And feign would spend an idle hour to play
With insects strangers to the moiling day
Creeping about each rush and grassy stem
And often wishes he was one of them

Daily #JohnClare postings 

#photography #poetry #environment

The birds…

The wood rides as wont wound beneath the oak bough

Still tempting the eye that admires to rove on

But stranger feet with in their lonliness now

& their old fellow hermits that lovd them are gone

The birds in the gardens shades nesting among

As fond of their neighbours that used to dwell bye

Hear strange voices now & stop short in the song

& startled peep down of fresh faces flye

Daily #JohnClare postings 

#photography #poetry #environment

 

Images by my friend #CarryAkroyd

The language of sighs

The Rose Of The World Was Dear Mary To Me
In The Days Of My Boyhood & Youth
I Told Her In Songs Where My Heart Wished To Be
& My Songs Were The Language of Truth

I Told Her In Looks When I Gazed In Her Eyes
That Mary Was Dearest To Me
I Told Her In Words & The Language Of Sighs
Where My Whole Heart’s Affections Would Be

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

In snugger shades

From covert hedge on either side
The blackbirds flutter'd terrified
Mistaking me for pilfering boy
That doth too oft their nests destroy
& ‘prink, prink, prink,’ they took to wing
In snugger shades to build & sing
From tufted grass or bush the hare
Oft sprung from her endanger'd lair
Surprise was startled on her rout
So near ones feet she bolted out

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

Luscious green

I love the luscious green before the bloom
The leaves & grass & even beds of moss
When leaves gin bud & spring prepares to come
The Ivys evergreen the brown green gorse
Plots of green weeds that barest roads engross
In fact I love the youth of each green thing
The grass the trees the bushes & the moss

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

 

Image by my friend #RachelBurch

The stream a silver streak between

While glides the stream a silver streak between

As glides the shaded clouds along the sky

Brightning & deep'ning loosing as theyre seen

In light & shade—so when old willows lean

Thus their broad shadow—runs the river bye

With tree & bush repleat a wilderd scene

& mossd & Ivyd sparkling on my eye—

O thus wild musing am I doubly blest

My woes unheeding—& my heart at rest

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

In livery dress

The black and yellow bumble first on wing
To buzz among the sallow's early flowers,
Hiding its nest in holes from fickle spring
Who stints his rambles with her frequent showers;
And one that may for wiser piper pass,
In livery dress half sables and half red,
Who laps a moss ball in the meadow grass
And hoards her stores when April showers have fled

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

Yield to joy

Lovley sweets that never cloy
Happiest hours that yield to joy
Hedgerows dappl'd green & white
Look so graceful to the sight
Meadows cloth'd in yellow hue
Banks streak'd oer with vi'lets hue
Yet their charms will soon decay
Soon they'l fade & dye away

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

Beautiful mortals

Beautiful mortals of the glowing earth

And children of the season crowd together
In showers and sunny weather
Ye beautiful spring hours
Sunshine and all together
I love wild flowers

The rain drops lodge on the swallows wing
Then fall on the meadow flowers
Cowslips and enemonies all come with spring
Beaded with first showers
The skylarks in the cowslips sing
I love wild flowers

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

Misterious skill

To thee earth swarmd with lovly things
The butterflye with spangld wings
& dragon flye & humble bee
Humd dreams of paradise with thee
& o thou fairest dearest still
If natures wild misterious skill
Beams that same rapture in thine eye
& left a love that cannot dye
If that fond taste was born to last
Nor vanishd with the summers past

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

 

Image by my friend #JohnAbbott

Lammas

A posting for Lammas day (1st August)

The bearded rye was in the row

The lintel in the pod

No grass without its sod did grow

No peas without a pod

Between the Lammas open tide

& harvest getting in

When Jockey walked by Jennys side

His courting to begin

My dear saith he you are sa sweet

Your face it is sa fair — 

Your bonnet bow is tied so neat

Im in love I do declair

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

Teazle burrs

I miss the heath its yellow furze
Mole-hills and rabbit tracks that lead
Through besom-ling & teazle burrs
That spread a wilderness indeed
The woodland oaks & all below
That their white-powdered branches shield
The mossy paths the very crow
Croaks music in my native field

Daily #JohnClare postings. 

#photography #poetry #environment

 

Image by my friend #JohnAbbott