Cool the wood


Now cool the wood my wanderings shrouds
'Neath arbours Nature weaves
Shut up from viewing fields & clouds
& buried deep in leaves
The sounds without amuse me still
Mixt with the sounds within— 
The scythe with sharpening tinkles shrill
The cuckoos soothing din

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Fairer light


What different shapes in leaves are seen
That oer my head embower
Clad in as many shades of green
As colours in the flower
My path now gleams with fairer light
The side approaches near
A heath now bolts upon the sight
& rabbit-tracks appear

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Urges her cows


Ere the sun the east reddens or yellows the hill
The morning breeze naturally warms
& doll where she urges her cows to stand still
The flies waken round em in swarms
The sun is all bustl[e] the meadows among
The waggons keep bowling away
Down wheel rifted rampers they jolter along
‘& while the sun shines they make hay’

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Playfull mirth


Feel warm hopes glow with earnest eagerness
To mark the signs that promise us success
As gleaming suns that twitter while they gleam
& dance their blazing shadows in the stream
Were small black moths dip light their fluttering wings
& heedless fishes leap in bouncing springs
Curving the flood tho winds withold their breath
In ceasless eddies with their playfull mirth

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Lovely and red


To see the sun rise thro the skirts of the wood

In his mantle so lovley and red
It cheers up my spirits and does me much good
As thro the cold stubbles I tred.
Tho not that his beams more advances the scene
Or adds to the Landscape a charm
But all that delights me by him may be seen
That the ensuing hours will be warm.

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The winter time is over love


The winter time is over love

White thorns begin to bud
& brown & green of freshness love
Enlivens all the wood
Theres white clouds got agen the sun
One daisey open on the green
The primrose shows its sulphur bud
Just where the hazel stulps are seen

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Early rising


Aside the green hills steepy brow
Where shades the oak its darksome bough
The maiden sat to milk her cow
The cause of early rising

The wild rose mingling with the shade
Stung with envy clos'd to fade
To see the rose her cheeks display'd
The fruits of early rising

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In telling way


& O how quiet sundays past away
When by that little gravel brook we lay
Where milking maidens on its shelving brink
Feared soiling clothes by kneeling down to drink
I sipt from out their hands in telling way
& seemed to make it more sense to stay
O how I long to see that pleasant place
& meet the welcome of each pleasant face
(fragment, from ‘The Wish’)

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The pasture pathway


Where youth has rovd & still where memory roves
The pasture pathway neath its willow groves
Ah as my eye looks oer these lovly scenes
All the delights of former life beholding
Spite of the pain the care that intervenes
When lovd remembrance is her bliss unfolding
Picking her childish posies on your greens
My soul can peer oer its distress awhile
& sorrows cheek find leisure for a smile

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I love thee


I love thee, Nature, with a boundless love!
The calm of earth, the storm of roaring woods!
The winds breathe happiness where'er I rove!
There's life's own music in the swelling floods!
My heart is in the thunder-melting clouds,
The snow-cap't mountain, and the rolling sea!
And hear ye not the voice where darkness shrouds
The heavens? There lives happiness for me!

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Claumpt over the moor


Ere the church bell i the morn had tung four
Fudging old Jemmy claumpt over the moor
He cockt up his beaver & nockt at the door
& up wi ye Jenney bawls he
Deuce take him god knows I een wisht him neck braken
But mizerdly dad & old mam was awaken
Who telld me take chance when it is to be taken
So jemmys fair drudge I mun be

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Grazeing Cattle


The Paigles Bloom In Shower's In Grassy Close

How Sweet To Be Among Their Blossoms Led
& Hear Sweet Nature To Herself Discourse
While Pale The Moon Is Bering Over Head
& Hear The Grazeing Cattle Softly Tread
Cropping The Hedgerows Newly Leafing Thorn
Sounds Soft As Visions Murmured Oer In Bed
At Dusky Eve Or Sober Silent Morn
For Such Delights Twere Happy Man Was Born

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Sweeping oer the land


Red lightning shot its flashes as they came 
& passing clouds seemed kindling into flame 
& strong & stronger came the sulphury smell 
With demons following in the breath of hell 
Laughing in mockery as the doomed complained 
Losing their pains in seeing others pained 
Fierce raged destruction sweeping oer the land 
& the last counted moment seemed at hand

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Green lanes that shut out burning skies


Of happiness & thoughts arise 
With home bred pictures many a one 
Green lanes that shut out burning skies 
& old crookd stiles to rest upon 
Above them hangs the maple tree 
Below grass swells a velvet hill 
& little footpaths sweet to see 
Go seeking sweeter places still

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Bawl freedom


Thoust heard the knave abusing those in power 
Bawl freedom loud & then opress the free
Thoust sheltered hypocrites in many a shower 
That when in power would never shelter thee
Thoust heard the knave supply his canting powers 
With wrongs illusions when he wanted friends 
That bawled for shelter when he lived in showers 
& when clouds vanished made thy shade amends

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Shadows dancing


The sun beams scarce molest me wi a smile 
So thick the leafy armies gather round 
& where they do the breeze blows cool the while 
Their leafy shadows dancing on the ground 
—Full many a flower too wishing to be seen 
Perks up its head the hiding grass between— 
In midwood silence thus how sweet to be 
Where all the noises that on peace intrude 
Comes from the chittering cricket bird & bee 
Whose songs have charms to sweeten solitude

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Home


So when the Traveller uncertain roams

On lost roads leading every where but home
Each vain desire that leaves his heart in pain
Each fruitless hope to cherish it in vain
Each hated track so slowly left behind
Makes for the home which night denies to find
& every wish that leaves the aching breast
Flies to the spot where all its wishes rest

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Lane path


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

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Mossy ground


The hedgerow bank where oft in searching ken

We both have crawl'd along the mossy ground

To hunt the snailhorn in his secret den

The thymy seated hill the hoof plod ground

Whose batterd surface ownd the marble ring

The straggling bush where many a nest was found

The shelterd hovel & the bathing spring

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Fetch the horses


& first of all a jobs laid out for Hodge
Boy fetch the horses but before yah go
Make haste I charge yah—now tis fine yah know
Them shocks want carreying—& that tedded hay
Some how or other must be made to day
Then boy make hast & let us see from this
How fast yah can go’ Hodge he answer'd ‘Yes’
But wisper'd to him self contrary
Not a Mite faster then I us'd to go

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Rivers wider floods


The landscapes stretching view that opens wide 
With dribbling brooks & rivers wider floods 
& hills & vales & darksome lowering woods 
With grains of varied hues & grasses pied 
The low brown cottage in the shelterd nook 
The steeple sprouting just above the trees 
Whose dangling leaves keep rustling in the breeze

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The oaks & open sky


Thro flowers & grass & many crippled brake 
Then garden clumps as nature wills to make 
Where oft he stands & pauses & admires 
& feels that happiness that never tires 
Now marking little tiny creeping things 
Creep on the leaves & then the coloured wings 
Of startled moth & eager butter flye 
That puzzled in the leaves & by & bye 
Mounts in the oaks & then the open sky

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Wizzing over head


The stirt'ling pewets as they pass

Scream joyous wizzing over head

Right glad the fields & meadow grass

Will quickly hide their carless shed

The rooks were yonder witchens spread

Quawk clamourous to the springs approach

Here silent from its watery bed

To hail its coming leaps the roach


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Quiet hanging blooms


Ive left my own old home of homes

Green fields & every pleasant place
The summer like a stranger comes
I pause & hardly know her face
I miss the hazels happy green
The bluebells quiet hanging blooms
Where envys sneer was never seen
Where staring malice never comes

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Their greenery


A little lane the brook runs close beside

& spangles in the sunshine while the fish glide swiftly by
& hedges leafing with the green spring tide
From out their greenery the old birds fly
& chirp & whistle in the morning sun
The pilewort glitters neath the pale blue sky
The little robin has its nest begun
& grass green linnets round the bushes fly

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While cows


Dames from milking trotting home
Said no sign was half so bad
& shakd their heads at ills to come
While cows restless from the ground
Plungd into the stream & drank
& the rings went wirling round
Till they toucht the flaggy bank

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A secret shade


Hot was the noon in summers sultry hour
The sun then raging with meridian power
When I more burning with the scorching heat
Of hot desire - lay hid in close retreat
Beneath the covert of a secret shade
Flush'd "with expectance of the lovley maid"
Sweet was the spot no one throughout the grove
Was better suited to the sports of Love

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Balm & Breezes


Now Come The Balm & Breezes Of The Spring
Not With The Pleasure's Of My Early Day's
When Nature Seemed One Endless Song To Sing
A Joyous Melody & Happy Praise
Ah Would They Come Agen—But Life Betrays
Quicksands & Gulphs & Storms That Howl & Sting
All Quiet Into Madness & Delays
Care Hides The Sunshine With Its Raven Wing
& Hell Glooms Sadness Oer The Songs Of Spring

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Like stars


Sweet solitude, what joy to be alone--

In wild, wood-shady dell to stay for hours.
Twould soften hearts if they were hard as stone
To see glad butterflies and smiling flowers.
Tis pleasant in these quiet lonely places,
Where not the voice of man our pleasure mars,
To see the little bees with coal black faces
Gathering sweets from little flowers like stars

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