Music in the noise

Come Queen of months in company
Wi all thy merry minstrelsy
The restless cuckoo absent long
& twittering swallows chimney song
& hedgerow crickets notes that run
From every bank that fronts the sun
& swathy bees about the grass
That stops wi every bloom they pass
& every minute every hour
Keep teazing weeds that wear a flower
& toil and childhoods humming joys
For there is music in the noise

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Sings in the air

Come maiden dear maiden a beautiful troop

Of images now the young morning doth wear

The lark leaves her nest & the dew splashes up

As she flies through the clover & sings in the air

The bushes that rustle & catch at thy gown

The trees that thy pathway envelopes in leaves

The grass smooth as velvet runs green up and down

& from the young morning a rapture receives

& from the green hedge that the path brushes nigh

The flight of a bird shakes the rain in the place

& the blackbird frit off from her nest rushing bye
Shakes a shower on the path that will sprinkle thy face

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Daybreak light

How beautiful is daybreak light betimes 
Threads thro the clouds the red sun sweetly climbs 
Up to our chamber windows thwart the sky 
The clouds like bright volcanoes slumber by 
Slowly & grand toil early out of doors
Goes praising the sweet time devoid of sorrow 
& prophesies the cuckoos song to morrow
Birds hop about each hedge & by the stack 
The small wren twits with tail cocked oer his back
Building his nest right early neath the shed 
Where cows in winter found a pleasant bed
Flowers thicken everywhere the very tops 
Of walls are thronged with springs delicious crops 
Of tiny snow-white blossoms thickly spread

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Come little Robin

Come come to my cottage & thou shalt be free
To perch on my finger or sit on my knee
Thou shalt eat of the crumbles of bread to thy fill
& have leisure to clean both thy feathers & bill
Then come little robin & never believe
Such warm Invitations are meant to deceive
In duty I'm bound to show mercy on thee
While God dont deny it to sinners like me

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This sweet vision

No fence of ownership crept in between 

To hide the prospect from the gazing eye
Its only bondage was the circling sky
A mighty flat undwarfed by bush & tree
Spread its faint shadow of immensity
& lost itself which seemed to eke its bounds
In the blue mist the orizons edge surrounds
Now this sweet vision of my boyish hours
Free as spring clouds & wild as forest flowers
Is faded all—a hope that blossomed free
& hath been once as it no more shall be
Enclosure came & trampled on the grave

Of labours rights & left the poor a slave

Photo from my friend #AdyKerry

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Happiest happiness

Unequal'd raptures happiest happiness

For sure no raptures can compare with thee
Now lovley Anna in her sunday dress
In softest pressure sits upon my knee.—
For O to see the snowey bosom heave
& feel those robes to me so softley cleave
Robes which half show what modesty consceals
While round her slender wa[i]ste I fling my arms
& while her eye whats wanting yet reveals
To me apears such (more than heavenly) charms
That might I wish—& could I be so blest
To have it granted—O I'd wish to be
For ever of this matchles maid posses'd
To bear her weight through all Eternity

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From Clare’s unfinished novel

The black thorn was in its blossom & the soldiers were reminded of their early days      & one of them said    in such a spot as this comrade I tended sheep & have been delighted at seeing the black thorn in blossom as the earnest of may day a coming      when we should play at crookhorn & duck under-water & pelt over the garland -- & I little thought then of where I should ramble & what I should see --      these days Richard are all over & our happiness is gone after them for some other boys to pick up & loose agen as we did -- 

& so they wandered along shortning the way by little remembrances of former days that the scene around them brought up in their minds -- untill the sun went to bed as red as a drunken man dropping as if in the midst of the waste that surrounded them      & they were astonished in the seeming boundless stretch of the common which like an ocean of waste seemed to have no shore of termination to human existance & no harbours of comfortable cottages -- for they had not only been out of the sight of smoaking chimneys for hours but had even lost all sight of human existance in the shape of foot paths or waggon tracks –

From Clare's 'The Two Soldiers' an episode in his aborted novel from the 1820s, now published with Clare’s title “The Memoirs of Uncle Barnaby" (Arbour Editions, 2017).

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A sheltering place

Black grows the southern sky betokening rain
& humming hive-bees homeward hurry bye
They feel the change so let us shun the grain
& take the broad road while our feet are dry
Ay there some dropples moistened on my face
& pattered on my hat--tis coming nigh
Lets look about & find a sheltering place
The little things around like you & I

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Sweet warbling

Thrice Welcome to thy song sweet warbling thrush
May you be happy as you still have been
The present sunshine warms your covert bush
The future clouds you know not what they mean
Vain foolish thought & why should ye be sad
Why be like me with ills to come oprest
To pass the present bliss that may be had
& wait on sorrow as a welcome guest
No sing thou on & let me sorrow still
I cant be happy be it as it will
In vain the sun gleams thro the prison grate
To cheer the felon thats condemnd to dye
His soul in anguish mourns impending fate
Such pains are his & such a one am I

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Rides litherly

Lapt up in sacks to shun the rain & wind
& shoes thick clouted with the sticking soil
& sidelings on his horse the careless hind
Rides litherly & singIng to his toil
The boy rides foremost where the sack is gone
& holds [it] with his hands to keep it on
Then splashing down the road in journey slow
Through mire & sludge with cracking whips they go
He lays his jacket with his lunchen bye
& drinks from horses footings when adry
They pass the maiden singing at her cow
& start the lark that roosted by the plough
That sings above them all the live long day
& on they drive & hollow care away

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The orchis tribes

Haunting thy mossy steeps to botanize

& hunt the orchis tribes where natures skill

Doth like my thoughts run into phantasies

Spider & bee all mimicking at will

Displaying powers that fool the proudly wise

Showing the wonders of great natures plan

In trifles insignificant & small

Puzzling the power of that great trifle man

Who finds no reason to be proud at all

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from ‘Solitude’

   

    O how sweet I cannot tell
    With thee at that hour to dwell
    Stretchd the mossy bank beside
    Lye to view the random tide
    Where no clowns has chopt from thence
    Bush nor stake to mend his fence

    Cornerd stones & pebbles round
    Breaking dasht wi mellow sound
    Wether this or that to see
    I am blest if Im wi thee
    & full dear has been the hour
    Spent wi in thy noon day bower
    Prest wi thee thy mossy seat
    O its unexpressive sweet

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I remember it well

The green where I tended my sheep when a boy
Has yielded its pride to the plough

& the shades where my infancy revelled in joy
The axe has left desolate now

Yet a bush lingers still that invites me to stop
What heart can such whimsies withstand
Where Susan once saw a birds nest in its top
& I reached her the eggs with my hand

& so long since the day I remember it well
It has stretched to a sizable tree
& the birds yearly come in its branches to dwell
As far from a jiant as me

On a favourite spot by the side of a brook
When Susan was just in her prime
A ripe bunch of nutts from her apron she took
& planted them close by my side

It has grown up with years & on many a bough
Groweth nutts like its parent agen
Where shepherds no doubt have oft sought them ere now
To please other susans since then

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Of dandelions

Tis May & yet the March flower Dandelion 

Is still in bloom among the Emerald grass 

Shining like guineas with the suns warm eye on 

We almost think they are gold as we pass 

Or fallen stars on a green sea of grass 

The[y] shine in fields on waste grounds near the town 

They closed like painters brush when even was 

At length they turn to nothing else but down 

While the rude winds blow of[f] each shadowy crown

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Three ‘fragments’

Three of the many Clare ‘fragments’ – poems with very few lines or those started and forgotten. 

Sweeter than roses was the face
Sweeter than roses was the face
For whom I pluckd the flower
Sweeter than heaven was the place
In that delightful hour

Beautiful woman visions dwell
Beautiful woman visions dwell
Of heavens joy about thee
& every step I take is hell
That walks thro' life without thee

Loves memories haunt my footsteps still
Loves memories haunt my footsteps still
Like ceaseless flowings of the river
Its mystic depths say what can fill
Sad disappointment waits for ever

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