No words dare tell

Along the road were coupld maid & swain
& dick from dolly now for gifts did sue
Hed gen her ribbons & he deemd again
Some kind return as nothing but his due
& he told things as ploughmen rarely knew
Bout breaking hearts & pains—a mighty spell
Her sunday clo'hs might damage wi the dew
She quite forgot them while he talkd so well
She gave the contest up at last to what no words dare tell

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty

Life?

A shadow moving by ones side
That would a substance seem
That is yet is not - though descried
Like skies beneath the stream
A tree thats  ever in the bloom
Whose fruit is never rife
A wish for joys that never come
Such are the hope of Life

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty

Autumn

Autumn comes laden with her ripened load
Of fruitage & so scatters them abroad
That each fern-smothered heath & mole-hill waste
Are black with bramble berries where in haste
The chubby urchins from the village hie
To feast them there stained with the purple dye
While painted woods around my rambles be
In draperies worthy of eternity
Yet will the leaves soon patter on the ground
& deaths deaf voice awake at every sound
One drops then others & the last that fell
Rings for those left behind their passing bell
Thus memory every where her tidings brings
How sad death robs us of lifes dearest things

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty

The lane path

O simple nature how I do delight

To pause upon thy trifles foolish things

So some woud call em on the summer night

Tracing the lane path where the dog rose hings

Wi dew drops seathd while chickering cricket sings

My eye cant help but glance upon its leaves

Where loves warm beauty steals her sweetest blush

When sweet the while the even silence heaves

Her pausing breath just trembling thro the bush

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty

September 1824

Took a walk in the fields: saw an old wood stile taken away from a familiar spot which it had occupied all my life. The posts were overgrown with ivy, and it seemed akin to nature and the spot where it stood, as though it had taken it on lease for an undisturbed existence. It hurt me to see it was gone, for my affections claim a friendship with such things; but nothing is lasting in this world.

Last year Langley Bush was destroyed -- an old white-thorn that had stood for more than a century, full of fame. The gipsies, shepherds, and herdsmen all had their tales of its history, and it will be long ere its memory is forgotten.

An excerpt from ‘Remembrances’

Summer's pleasures they are gone like to visions every one,
And the cloudy days of autumn and of winter cometh on.
I tried to call them back, but unbidden they are gone
Far away from heart and eye and forever far away.
Dear heart, and can it be that such raptures meet decay?
I thought them all eternal when by Langley Bush I lay,
I thought them joys eternal when I used to shout and play
On its bank at “clink and bandy,” “chock” and “taw” and “ducking stone,”
Where silence sitteth now on the wild heath as her own
Like a ruin of the past all alone

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty

Of fame

I would not wish the burning blaze
     Of fame around a restless world
The thunder & the storm of praise
     In crowded tumults heard & hurled
I would not be a flower to stand
     The stare of every passer-bye
But in some nook of fairyland,
     Seen in the praise of beautys eye

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty

Greensward pathways

The Vicars greensward pathways once his pride

His woodbine bowers that used his doors to hide
& he himself full often in his chair
Smoaking his pipe & conning sermons there
The yard & garden roods his only farms
& all his stock the hive bees yearly swarms
Are swept away—their produce & their pride
Were doomed to perish when the owner dyd
Fresh faces came with little taste or care
& joyd to ruin what was his to rear
His garden plants & blossoms all are fled
& docks & nettles blossom in their stead

Follow for daily #JohnClare postings

#poetry  #environment #truth #honesty