The Vixen

Among the taller wood with ivy hung,
The old fox plays and dances round her young.
She snuffs and barks if any passes bye
And swings her tail and turns prepared to fly.
The horseman hurries bye, she bolts to see,
And turns agen, from danger never free.
If any stands she runs among the poles
And barks and snaps and drives them in the holes.
The shepherd sees them and the boy goes bye
And gets a stick and progs the hole to try.
They get all still and lie in safety sure
And out again when every thing's secure
And start and snap at blackbirds bouncing bye
To fight and catch the great white butterfly.
 

The Soldier

Home furthest off grows dearer from the way;
And when the army in the Indias lay
Friends' letters coming from his native place
Were like old neighbours with their country face.
And every opportunity that came
Opened the sheet to gaze upon the name
Of that loved village where he left his sheep
For more contented peaceful folk to keep;
And friendly faces absent many a year
Would from such letters in his mind appear.
And when his pockets, chafing through the case,
Wore it quite out ere others took the place,
Right loath to be of company bereft
He kept the fragments while a bit was left.
 

Decay (final)

Aye, Poesy hath passed away,
And Fancy's visions undeceive us;
The night hath ta'en the place of day,
And why should passing shadows grieve us?
I thought the flowers upon the hills
Were flowers from Adam's open gardens;
But I have had my summer thrills,
And I have had my heart's rewardings.
So Poesy is on the wane,
I hardly know her face again.

And Friendship it hath burned away,
Like to a very ember cooling,
A make-believe on April day
That sent the simple heart a-fooling;
Mere jesting in an earnest way,
Deceiving on and still deceiving;
And Hope is but a fancy-play,
And Joy the art of true believing;
For Poesy is on the wane,
 

Decay (III)

Love's sun went down without a frown,
For very joy it used to grieve us;
I often think the West is gone,
Ah, cruel Time, to undeceive us.
The stream it is a common stream,
Where we on Sundays used to ramble,
The sky hangs oer a broken dream,
The bramble's dwindled to a bramble!
O Poesy is on the wane,
I cannot find her haunts again.

Mere withered stalks and fading trees,
And pastures spread with hills and rushes,
Are all my fading vision sees;
Gone, gone are rapture's flooding gushes!
When mushrooms they were fairy bowers,
Their marble pillars overswelling,
And Danger paused to pluck the flowers
That in their swarthy rings were dwelling.
Yes, Poesy is on the wane,
Nor joy nor fear is mine again.
(tbc) 

Decay (II)

I sat beside the pasture stream,
When Beauty's self was sitting by,
The fields did more than Eden seem
Nor could I tell the reason why.
I often drank when not adry
To pledge her health in draughts divine;
Smiles made it nectar from the sky,
Love turned een water into wine.
O Poesy is on the wane,
I cannot find her face again.

The sun those mornings used to find,
Its clouds were other-country mountains,
And heaven looked downward on the mind,
Like groves, and rocks, and mottled fountains.
Those heavens are gone, the mountains grey
Turned mist--the sun, a homeless ranger,
Pursues alone his naked way,
Unnoticed like a very stranger.
O Poesy is on the wane,
Nor love nor joy is mine again.
(tbc)
 

Decay (I)

O Poesy is on the wane,
For Fancy's visions all unfitting;
I hardly know her face again,
Nature herself seems on the flitting.
The fields grow old and common things,
The grass, the sky, the winds a-blowing;
And spots, where still a beauty clings,
Are sighing "going! all a-going!"
O Poesy is on the wane,
I hardly know her face again.

The bank with brambles overspread,
And little molehills round about it,
Was more to me than laurel shades,
With paths of gravel finely clouted;
And streaking here and streaking there,
Through shaven grass and many a border,
With rutty lanes had no compare,
And heaths were in a richer order.
But Poesy is on the wane,
I hardly know her face again.

(tbc) 

In Hilly-Wood

How sweet to be thus nestling deep in boughs,
Upon an ashen stoven pillowing me;
Faintly are heard the ploughmen at their ploughs,
But not an eye can find its way to see.
The sunbeams scarce molest me with a smile,
So thick the leafy armies gather round;
And 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 mid-wood silence, thus, how sweet to be;
Where all the noises, that on peace intrude,
Come from the chittering cricket, bird, and bee,
Whose songs have charms to sweeten solitude.
 

16 April 1825

Took a walk in the fields, bird-nesting and botanizing, and had like to have been taken up as a poacher in Hilly Wood, by a meddlesome, conceited gamekeeper belonging to Sir John Trollope. He swore that he had seen me in the act, more than once, of shooting game, when I never shot even so much as a sparrow in my life. What terrifying rascals these woodkeepers and gamekeepers are! They make a prison of the forest, and are its gaolers.

Clare's Diary

Spring's Messengers

(Spring is late all over the country... so a nostalgic look at an early (false?) Spring from Clare)

Where slanting banks are always with the sun
The daisy is in blossom even now;
And where warm patches by the hedges run
The cottager when coming home from plough
Brings home a cowslip root in flower to set.
Thus ere the Christmas goes the spring is met
Setting up little tents about the fields
In sheltered spots. - Primroses when they get
Behind the wood's old roots, where ivy shields
Their crimpled, curdled leaves, will shine and hide.
Cart ruts and horses' footings scarcely yield
A slur for boys, just crizzled and that's all.
Frost shoots his needles by the small dyke side,
And snow in scarce a feather's seen to fall.

 

The Yellowhammer

When shall I see the white-thorn leaves agen,
And yellowhammers gathering the dry bents
By the dyke side, on stilly moor or fen,
Feathered with love and nature's good intents?
Rude is the tent this architect invents,
Rural the place, with cart ruts by dyke side.
Dead grass, horse hair, and downy-headed bents
Tied to dead thistles--she doth well provide,
Close to a hill of ants where cowslips bloom
And shed oer meadows far their sweet perfume.
In early spring, when winds blow chilly cold,
The yellowhammer, trailing grass, will come
To fix a place and choose an early home,
With yellow breast and head of solid gold.
 

From 'June' (in anticipation).

Now summer is in flower and natures hum
Is never silent round her sultry bloom
Insects as small as dust are never done
Wi' glittering dance and reeling in the sun
And green wood fly and blossom haunting bee
Are never weary of their melody
Round field hedge now flowers in full glory twine
Large bindweed bells wild hop and streakd woodbine
That lift athirst their slender throated flowers
Agape for dew falls and for honey showers
These round each bush in sweet disorder run
And spread their wild hues to the sultry sun. 

A fragment...

Clouds rack and drive before the wind
In shapes and forms of every kind
Like waves that rise without the roars
And rocks that guard untrodden shores
Now castles pass majestic bye
And ships in peaceful havens lie
These gone ten thousand shapes ensue
For ever beautiful and new
 

The Lament of Swordy Well (Final)

Carry's "Wet Meadow" brings to an end Clare's Lament.

Do visit Swaddywell if you are in the Helpston vicinity, it is very much worth the effort.

And if I could find a friend
With no deciet to sham
Who'd send me some few sheep to tend
And leave me as I am
To keep my hills from cart and plough
And strife and mongerel men
And as spring found me find em now
I should look up agen

And save his Lordships woods that past
The day of danger dwell
Of all the fields I am the last
That my own face can tell
Yet what with stone pits delving holes
And strife to buy and sell
My name will quickly be the whole
Thats left of swordy well 

The Lament of Swordy Well (VIII)

Carry's "Landfill site" (www.carryakroyd.co.uk).
Would this have happened to Swaddywell without the Langdyke Trust?

Lord bless ye I was kind to all
And poverty in me
Could always find a humble stall
A rest and lodging free
Poor bodys with a hungry ass
I welcomed many a day
And gave him tether room to grass
And never said him nay

There was a time my bit of ground
Made freemen of the slave
The ass no pinard dare to pound
When I his supper gave
The gipseys camp was not afraid
I made his dwelling free
Till vile enclousure came and made
A parish slave of me

The gipseys further on sojourn
No parish bounds they like
No sticks I own and would earth burn
I shouldnt own a dyke
I am no friend to lawless work
Nor would a rebel be
And why I call a christian turk
Is they are turks to me
(tbc)
 

The Lament of Swordy Well (VII)

... and yes, Swaddywell in July 2005

(VII)
And should the price of grain get high
Lord help and keep it low
I shant posses a single flye
Or get a weed to grow
I shant possess a yard of ground
To bid a mouse to thrive
For gain has put me in a pound
I scarce can keep alive

I own Im poor like many more
But then the poor mun live
And many came for miles before
For what I had to give
But since I fell upon the town
They pass me with a sigh
Ive scarce the room to say sit down
And so they wander bye

Though now I seem so full of clack
Yet when yer' riding bye
The very birds upon my back
Are not more fain to flye
I feel so lorn in this disgrace
God send the grain to fall
I am the oldest in the place
And the worst sereved of all
(tbc)

 

The Lament of Swordy Well (VI)

Another July 2005 view

The restoration of Swaddywell Pit is an important part of the Langdyke Countryside Trust's work, and at the end of 2004 the Trust received a grant for £28,000 from the Aggregates Levy Sustainable Fund (ALSF) to support its work at the site.

(VI)
I am no man to whine and beg
But fond of freedom still
I hing no lies on pitys peg
To bring a gris to mill
On pitys back I neednt jump
My looks speak loud alone
My only tree the've left a stump
And nought remains my own

My mossy hills gains greedy hand
And more then greedy mind
Levels into a russet land
Nor leaves a bend behind
In summers gone I bloomed in pride
Folks came for miles to prize
My flowers that bloomed no where beside
And scarce believed their eyes

Yet worried with a greedy pack
They rend and delve and tear
The very grass from off my back
Ive scarce a rag to wear
Gain takes my freedom all away
Since its dull suit I wore
And yet scorn vows I never pay
And hurts me more and more
(tbc) 

The Lament of Swordy Well (V)

Carry Ackroyd's "A Swaddywell Field" - See http://www.carryakroyd.co.uk

The Langdyke Countryside Trust was founded in 2000 to celebrate John Clare's legacy to natural history and promote and safeguard landscapes and places of importance through his writings.

No now not een a stone can lie
Im just what eer they like
My hedges like the winter flye
And leave me but the dyke
My gates are thrown from off the hooks
The parish thoroughfare
Lord he thats in the parish books
Has little wealth to spare

I couldnt keep a dust of grit
Nor scarce a grain of sand
But bags and carts claimed every bit
And now theyve got the land
I used to bring the summer life
To many a butterflye
But in oppressions iron strife
Dead tussocks bow and sigh

Ive scarce a nook to call my own
For things that creep or flye
The beetle hiding neath a stone
Does well to hurry bye
Stock eats my struggles every day
As bare as any road
He's sure to be in somethings way
If eer he stirs abroad
(tbc) 

The Lament of Swordy Well (IV)

Swaddywell butterflies

Then villagers, and members of the John Clare Society decided to take action and set up the Langdyke Countryside Trust to restore Swaddywell to its natural beauty and turn it into a nature reserve.

Parish allowance gaunt and dread
Had it the earth to keep
Would even pine the bees to dead
To save an extra keep
Prides workhouse is a place that yields
From poverty its gains
And mines a workhouse for the fields
A starving the remains

The bees flye round in feeble rings
And find no blossom bye
Then thrum their almost weary wings
Upon the moss and die
Rabbits that find my hills turned oer
Forsake my poor abode
They dread a workhouse like the poor
And nibble on the road

If with a clover bottle now
Spring dares to lift her head
The next day brings the hasty plough
And makes me miserys bed
The butterflyes may wir to come
I cannot keep em now
Nor can they bear my parish home
That withers on my brow
(tbc) 

The Lament of Swordy Well (III)

Another view from July 2005

During the Second World War, Swaddywell was used as a bomb dump and after the war the site was filled and returned to agricultural land. Then during the 1980s it became a landfill site. In 1997, adding insult to injury, developers bought the site and turned it into the National Auto Showground with plans to host car rallies there.

When war their tyrant prices got
I trembled with alarms
they fell and saved my little spot
Or towns had turned to farms
Let profit keep an humble place
That gentry may be known
Let pedigrees their honours trace
And toil enjoy its own

The silver springs grown naked dykes
Scarce own a buch of rushes
When grain got high the tasteless tykes
Grubbed up trees bank and bushes
And me they turned inside out
For sand and grit and stones
And turned my old green hills about
And pickt my very bones

These things that claim my own as theirs
Where born but yesterday
But ere I fell to town affairs
I were as proud as they
I kept my horses cows and sheep
And built the town below
Ere they had cat or dog to keep
And then to use me so
(tbc) 

The Lament of Swordy Well (II)

Carry Ackroyd's wonderful painting of Swaddywell:
"At Swaddywell Pit" Watercolour 2004 (http://www.carryakroyd.co.uk) Used with permission.

In the 20th century, Swaddywell became one of England's first nature reserves and was leased by the National Trust between 1915 and 1924. However, Swaddywell was sold in 1924 and quarrying resumed.

In parish bonds I well may wail
Reduced to every shift
Pity may grieve at troubles tale
But cunning shares the gift
Harvests with plenty on his brow
Leaves losses taunt with me
Yet gain comes yearly with the plough
And will not let me be

Alas dependance thou'rt a brute
Want only understands
His feelings wither branch and root
That falls in parish hands
The much that clouts the ploughmans shoe
The moss that hides the stone
Now Im become the parish due
Is more then I can own

Though Im no man yet any wrong
Some sort of right may seek
And I am glad if een a song
Gives me the room to speak
Ive got among such grubbing geer
And such a hungry pack
If I brought harvest twice a year
They'd bring me nothing back
 

The Lament of Swordy Well (I)

Swaddywell Pit - July 2005

Swaddywell, or Swordywell as it was known 200 years ago when John Clare grew up, lived and worked nearby in Helpston, had been the site of a quarry since Roman times. It takes its name from a nearby spring where an ancient sword was reputedly found. In medieval times, quarries like Swaddywell would have provided stone for local churches and cathedrals such as Peterborough and Ely.

John Clare's "The Lament of Swordy Well"

Pe[ti]tioners are full of prayers
To fall in pitys way
But if her hand the gift forebears
Theyll sooner swear than pray
They're not the worst to want who lurch
On plenty with complaints
No more then those who go to church
Are eer the better saints

I hold no hat to beg a mite
Nor pick it up when thrown
Nor limping leg I hold in sight
But pray to keep my own
Where profit gets his clutches in
Theres little he will leave
Gain stooping for a single pin
Will stick it on his sleeve

For passers bye I never pin
No troubles to my breast
Nor carry round some names
More money from the rest
Im swordy well a piece of land
Thats fell upon the town
Who worked me till I couldnt stand
And crush me now Im down

(tbc)
 

from 'November'

Yet but awhile the slumbering weather flings
Its murky prison round--then winds wake loud;
With sudden stir the startled forest sings
Winter's returning song-cloud races cloud.
And the horizon throws away its shroud,
Sweeping a stretching circle from the eye;
Storms upon storms in quick succession crowd,
And oer the sameness of the purple sky
Heaven paints, with hurried hand, wild hues of every dye.
 

The Winter's Spring

The winter comes; I walk alone,
I want no bird to sing;
To those who keep their hearts their own
The winter is the spring.
No flowers to please--no bees to hum--
The coming spring's already come.

I never want the Christmas rose
To come before its time;
The seasons, each as God bestows,
Are simple and sublime.
I love to see the snowstorm hing;
'Tis but the winter garb of spring.

I never want the grass to bloom:
The snowstorm's best in white.
I love to see the tempest come
And love its piercing light.
The dazzled eyes that love to cling
O'er snow-white meadows sees the spring.

I love the snow, the crumpling snow
That hangs on everything,
It covers everything below
Like white dove's brooding wing,
A landscape to the aching sight,
A vast expanse of dazzling light.

It is the foliage of the woods
That winters bring--the dress,
White Easter of the year in bud,
That makes the winter Spring.
The frost and snow his posies bring,
Nature's white spurts of the spring.

 

Signs of Winter

The cat runs races with her tail. The dog
Leaps oer the orchard hedge and knarls the grass.
The swine run round and grunt and play with straw,
Snatching out hasty mouthfuls from the stack.
Sudden upon the elmtree tops the crow
Unceremonious visit pays and croaks,
Then swops away. From mossy barn the owl
Bobs hasty out--wheels round and, scared as soon,
As hastily retires. The ducks grow wild
And from the muddy pond fly up and wheel
A circle round the village and soon, tired,
Plunge in the pond again. The maids in haste
Snatch from the orchard hedge the mizzled clothes
And laughing hurry in to keep them dry.
 

Don Juan a Poem

‘Poets are born’ – & so are whores – the trade is   

Grown universal – in these canting days          

Women of fashion must of course be ladies     

& whoreing is the business – that still pays     

Playhouses Ball rooms – there the masquerade is  

– To do what was of old – & now adays          

Their maids – nay wives so innoscent & blooming   

Cuckold their spouses to seem honest women

                                                                         

Milton sung Eden & the fall of man                   

Not woman for the name implies a wh—e        

& they would make a ruin of his plan               

Falling so often they can fall no lower              

Tell me a worse delusion if you can                  

For innoscence – & I will sing no more             

Wherever mischief is tis womans brewing        

Created from manself – to be mans ruin

                                                                         

The flower in bud hides from the fading sun    

& keeps the hue of beauty on its cheek           

But when full blown they into riot run              

The hue turns pale & lost each ruddy streak    

So ’t’is with woman who pretends to shun      

Immodest actions which they inly seek            

Night hides the wh–e – cupboards tart & pasty      

Flora was p-x-d – & womans quite as nasty

                                                                         

Marriage is nothing but a driveling hoax          

To please old codgers when they’re turned of forty

I wed & left my wife like other folks                  

But not untill I found her false & faulty             

O woman fair – the man must pay thy jokes    

Such makes a husband very often naughty     

Who falls in love will seek his own undoing      

The road to marriage is – ‘the road to ruin’

                                                                         

Love worse then debt or drink or any fate       

It is the damnest smart of matrimony              

A hell incarnate is a woman-mate                    

The knot is tied – & then we loose the honey  

A wife is just the protetype to hate                  

Commons for stock & warrens for the coney    

Are not more trespassed over in rights plan    

Then this incumberance on the rights of man                   

There’s much said about love & more of women     

I wish they were as modest as they seem       

Some borrow husbands till their cheeks are blooming     

Not like the red rose blush – but yellow cream

Lord what a while those good days are in coming –        

Routs Masques & Balls – I wish they were a dream

– I wish for poor men luck – an honest praxis  

Cheap food & cloathing – no corn laws or taxes

                                                                         

I wish – but there is little got bye wishing       

I wish that bread & great coats ne’er had risen      

I wish that there was some such word as ‘pishun’  

For ryhme sake for my verses must be dizen   

With dresses fine – as hooks with bait for fishing   

I wish all honest men were out of prison         

I wish M.P’s. would spin less yarn – nor doubt 

But burn false bills & cross bad taxes out

                                                                         

I wish young married dames were not so frisky      

Nor hide the ring to make believe they’re single     

I wish small beer was half as good as whiskey

& married dames with buggers would not mingle    

There’s some too cunning far & some too frisky      

& here I want a ryhme – so write down ‘jingle’

& there’s such putting in – in whores crim con 

Some mouths would eat forever & eat on

                                                                         

Childern are fond of sucking sugar candy         

& maids of sausages – larger the better          

Shopmen are fond of good sigars & brandy     

& I of blunt – & if you change the letter           

To C or K it would be quite as handy                

& throw the next away – but I’m your debtor  

For modesty – yet wishing nought between us       

I’d hawl close to a she as vulcan did to venus

                                                                         

I really cant tell what this poem will be            

About – nor yet what trade I am to follow       

I thought to buy old wigs – but that will kill me

With cold starvation – as they’re beaten hollow     

Long speeches in a famine will not fill me         

& madhouse traps still take me by the collar    

So old wig bargains now must be forgotten     

The oil that dressed them fine has made them rotten               

I wish old wigs were done with ere they’re mouldy

I wish – but heres the papers large & lusty     

With speeches that full fifty times they’ve told ye   

– Noble Lord John to sweet Miss Fanny Fusty  

Is wed – a lie good reader I ne’er sold ye        

– Prince Albert goes to Germany & must he     

Leave the queens snuff box where all fools are strumming      

From addled eggs no chickens can be coming

                                                                         

Whigs strum state fiddle strings untill they snap     

With cuckoo cuckold cuckoo year by year         

The razor plays it on the barbers strap            

– The sissars grinder thinks it rather quere     

That labour wont afford him ‘one wee drap’     

Of ale or gin or half & half or beer                    

– I wish prince Albert & the noble dastards     

Who wed the wives – would get the noble bastards

                                                                         

I wish prince Albert on his german journey      

I wish the Whigs were out of office &               

Pickled in law books of some good atorney      

For ways & speeches few can understand       

They’ll bless ye when in power – in prison scorn ye

& make a man rent his own house & land –     

I wish prince Alberts queen was undefiled       

– & every man could get his wife with child

                                                                         

I wish the devil luck with all my heart               

As I would any other honest body                   

His bad name passes bye me like a f—t           

Stinking of brimstone – then like whisky toddy

We swallow sin which seems to warm the heart     

– There’s no imputing any sin to God – he       

Fills hell with work – & is’n’t it a hard case       

To leave old whigs & give to hell the carcass

                                                                         

Me–b—ne may throw his wig to little Vicky       

& so resign his humbug & his power                

& she with the young princess mount the dickey    

On ass milk diet for her german tour                

Asses like ministers are rather tricky                

I & the country proves it every hour                 

W–ll—gt–n & M–lb—n in their station               

Coblers to queens – are phisic to the nation           

These batch of toadstools on this rotten tree  

Shall be the cabinet of any queen                    

Though not such coblers as her servants be    

They’re of Gods making – that is plainly seen  

Nor red nor green nor orange – they are free  

To thrive & flourish as the Whigs have been    

But come tomorrow – like the Whigs forgotten

You’ll find them withered stinking dead & rotten

                                                                         

Death is an awfull thing it is by God                 

I’ve said so often & I think so now                    

Tis rather droll to see an old wig nod               

Then doze & die the devil don’t know how       

Odd things are wearisome & this is odd –        

Tis better work then kicking up a row              

I’m weary of old Whigs & old whigs heirs         

& long been sick of teazing God with prayers

                                                                         

I’ve never seen the cow turn to a bull              

I’ve never seen the horse become an ass       

I’ve never seen an old brawn cloathed in whool –  

But I have seen full many a bonny lass            

& wish I had one now beneath the cool           

Of these high elms – Muse tell me where I was      

O – talk of turning I’ve seen Whig & Tory         

Turn imps of hell – & all for Englands glory

                                                                         

I love good fellowship & wit & punning            

I love ‘true love’ & God my taste defend          

I hate most damnably all sorts of cunning –     

I love the Moor & Marsh & Ponders End –        

I do not like the song of ‘cease your funning’   

I love a modest wife & trusty friend                 

– Bricklayers want lime as I want rhyme for fillups  
– So here’s a health to sweet Eliza Phillips

LP 89 amongst other places

From 'January'

At last! We return from 10 weeks of travelling... USA... New Zealand and South Africa. But it's great to be back, even to an English January. We resume our perambulations through John Clare's work with an excerpt from 'January'.

"... unperceived, through key-holes creep,
When all around have sunk to sleep,
To feast on what the cotter leaves,--
Mice are not reckoned greater thieves.
They take away, as well as eat,
And still the housewife's eye they cheat,
In spite of all the folks that swarm
In cottage small and larger farm;
They through each key-hole pop and pop,
Like wasps into a grocer's shop,
With all the things that they can win
From chance to put their plunder in;--
As shells of walnuts, split in two
By crows, who with the kernels flew;
Or acorn-cups, by stock-doves plucked,
Or egg-shells by a cuckoo sucked;
With broad leaves of the sycamore
They clothe their stolen dainties oer:
And when in cellar they regale,
Bring hazel-nuts to hold their ale;
With bung-holes bored by squirrels well,
To get the kernel from the shell;
Or maggots a way out to win,
When all is gone that grew within;
And be the key-holes eer so high,
Rush poles a ladder's help supply.
Where soft the climbers fearless tread,
On spindles made of spiders' thread.
And foul, or fair, or dark the night,
Their wild-fire lamps are burning bright:
For which full many a daring crime
Is acted in the summer-time..."