A reflection in autumn

To mark what looks like early autumn here in East Devon, a poem from Clare's wonderful collection "Poems descriptive of rural life and scenery" (1820)

A REFLECTION IN AUTUMN
Now Autumn's come—adieu the pleasing greens
The charming Lanscape & the flowrey plain
All are deserted from these motley scenes
With blighted yellow ting'd & russet stain
Tho desolation seems to triumph here
Yet these are spring to what we still shall find
The trees must all in nakedness appear
'Reft of their foliage by the blustry wind
Just so 'twill fare with me in Autumns life
Just so I'd wish—but may the trunk & all
Die with the leaves—nor taste that wintry strife
Where Sorrows urge—& fear Impedes the fall!

Cloud Shapes

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

The scattered clouds lie calm and still,
And day throws gold on every hill;
Their thousand heads in glory run,
As each were worlds and owned a sun.
The rime it clings to everything,
It beards the early buds of spring;
The mossy pales, the orchard spray,
Are feathered with its silver-grey.

The Stranger (click here)

In 'Hymns Ancient and Modern' there is a single song/poem by John Clare: 'The Stranger'. For some years we have felt it needed a modern setting, so here is our offering. The music was composed by David Rowe, and was first performed in St. Botolph's Church, Helpston at the John Clare Festival in July 2010. Helpston, is the village in which John Clare was born, and was his muse throughout his long life. Clare died in 1864 and is buried in St. Botolph's Churchyard.

A stranger once did bless the earth
who never caused a heart to mourn,
whose very voice gave sorrow mirth;
and how did earth his worth return?
it spurned him from its lowliest lot:
the meanest station owned him not.

An outcast thrown in sorrow's way,
a fugitive that knew no sin,
yet in lone places forced to stray;
men would not take the stranger in.
Yet peace, though much himself he mourned,
was all to others he returned.

His presence was a peace to all,
he bade the sorrowful rejoice.
Pain turned to pleasure at his call,
health lived and issued from his voice;
he healed the sick, and sent abroad
the dumb rejoicing in the Lord.

The blind met daylight in his eye,
the joys of everlasting day;
the sick found health in his reply,
the cripple threw his crutch away.
Yet he with troubles did remain,
and suffered poverty and pain.

It was for sin he suffered all
to set the world-imprisoned free,
to cheer the weary when they call;
and who could such a stranger be?
The God, who hears each human cry,
and came, a Saviour, from on high.

The Village Funeral (excerpt)

The Orphans' grief and sorrow, so severe,
To every heart in pity's language speak ;
E'en the rough sexton can't withhold the tear,
That steals unnotic'd down his furrow'd cheek.

Who but is griev'd to see the Fatherless
Stroll with their rags unnotic'd through the street?
What eye but moistens at their sad distress,
And sheds compassion's tear whene'er they meet?

Yon Workhouse stands as their asylum now.
The place where Poverty demands to live;
Where parish Bounty scowls his scornful brow,
And grudges the scant fare he's forc'd to give.

Oh, may I die before I'm doom'd to seek
That last resource of hope, but ill supplied ;
To claim the humble pittance once a week,
Which justice forces from disdainful pride! —

AVhere the lost Orphan, lowly bending, weeps,
Unnotic'd by the heedless as they pass.
There the grave closes where a Mother sleeps.
With brambles platted on the tufted grass.

Search to find Britain's favourite poem (Click here)

The National Trust has set itself the near impossible task of choosing Britain’s favourite poem about the countryside, and Clare's sonnet "On a lane in Spring" is on the shortlist. Seems to me after reading the list of selected poems, that I could have chosen rather better... as could many. That being said, click on the title above to read the Daily Telegraph's piece on the 'search', published today.

The Clare poem 'chosen' is "On a lane in Spring":

A Little Lane, the brook runs close beside
And spangles in the sunshine while the fish glide swiftly by
And hedges leafing with the green spring tide
From out their greenery the old birds fly
And chirp and whistle in the morning sun
The pilewort glitters 'neath the pale blue sky
The little robin has its nest begun
And grass green linnets round the bushes fly
How Mild the Spring Comes in; the daisy buds
Lift up their golden blossoms to the sky
How lovely are the pingles and the woods
Here a beetle runs; and there a fly
Rests on the Arum leaf in bottle green
And all the Spring in this Sweet lane is seen

Mist in the Meadows

The evening oer the meadow seems to stoop
More distant lessens the diminished spire
Mist in the hollows reaks and curdles up
Like fallen clouds that spread – and things retire
Less seen and less – the shepherd passes near
And little distant most grotesquely shades
As walking without legs – lost to his knees
As through the rawky creeping smoke he wades
Now half way up the arches disappear
And small the bits of sky that glimmer through
Then trees loose all but tops – I meet the fields
And now indistinctness passes bye
The shepherd all his length is seen again
And further on the village meets the eye.

(Thanks to Simona Cola for reminding me of this brilliant poem)

Nutting... by David Rowe

'Nutting' ~ Clare's poem set to music by David Rowe (just click on the title above).

In 'nutting' Clare recalls his early courtship with Mary Joyce, who was to become his life-long muse. They never married although in his later life Clare was convinced she had been his first wife.

Right rosy gleamed the autumn morn
Right golden shone the autumn sun
The mowers swept the bleachéd corn
While long their early shades did run

The leaves were burnt to many hues
The hazel nuts were ripe & brown
My Mary’s kindness could but choose
To pluck them when I bore them down

The shells her auburn hair did show
A semblance faint yet beautiful
She smiled to hear me tell her so
Till I forgot the nuts to pull

She started at each little sound
The branches made—yet would her eye
Regret the gloom encroaching round
That told her night was in the sky

I helped her through the hedge row gap
& thought the very thorns unkind
As not to part—while in her lap
She sought the ripest bunch to find

T’was Mary’s smiles & sweet replies
That gave the sky so sweet a stain
So bright I never saw him rise
Nor ever set so sweet again

Farewell to the Cornfield

Farewell to the cornfield and meadow so green
Farewell to the white thorn and willow and Jean
Farewell to the haunts O' her childhood and mine
Where green banks had peace and my Jean looked divine
We're parted and may be for ever we part
Still Jeanie shall be the choice girl of my heart

Farewell to the cornfield and meadow so green
Farewell to the white thorn and willow and Jean
The meadows will be just as green when I'm gone
To the eyes o' my Jean while my heart like a stone
Lies cold in my breast while the scene I survey
To think of to-morrow that bears me away

From all I once loved and am cherishing yet
The wild flowers O' summer wi' honey dews wet
The path o'er the meadows the style i' the lane
My Jeanie will see them and know them again
To the wide roaring ocean and fathomless brine
I wander my Jean where thou still may be mine

If thy heart it be true love mine still thou shalt be
Though I perish by shipwreck and drown i the Sea
So farewell green meadows and farewell my Jean
To the willow and thorn where together we've been
All lonely I go to the wide raving sea
But true love will bring me safe back unto thee

Solitude (lines 81-104)

Where the swain the branches lops,
And o'erhead with rushes tops;
Where, with woodbine's sweet perfume,
And the rose's blushing bloom,
Loveliest ceiling of the bower,
Arching in, peeps many a flower;
While a hill of thyme so sweet,
Or a moss'd stone, forms a seat.

There, as 'tween-light hangs the eve,
I will watch thy bosom heave;
Marking then the darksome flows
Night's gloom o'er thy mantle throws;
Fondly gazing on thine eye
As it rolls its ecstasy,
When thy solemn musings caught
Tell thy soul's absorb'd in thought.

When thy finely folded arm
O'er thy bosom beating warm
Wraps thee melancholy round;
And thy ringlets wild unbound
On thy lily shoulders lie,
Like dark streaks in morning's sky.
Peace and silence sit with thee,
And peace alone is heaven to me.

A Scene

[Image: ‘Out of Doors’ by Carry Akroyd]

The Landscape’s stretching view that opens wide,
With dribbling brooks, and river’s wider floods,
And hills, and vales, and darksome lowering woods
With grains of varied hues, and grasses pied;
The low brown cottage in the shelter'd nook;
The steeple, peeping just above the trees
Whose dangling leaves keep rustling in the breeze;
And thoughtful shepherd bending o’er his hook;
And maidens stripp’d, haymaking too, appear;
And Hodge a whistling at his fallow plough;
And herdsman hallooing to intruding cow;
All these, with hundreds more, far off and near
Approach my sight; and please to such excess,
That language fails the pleasure to express.

There's music in the songs of birds

There's music in the songs of birds
There's music in the bee
There's music in a woman’s voice
When sitting on your knee

While walking in the mossy vales
Beneath the spreading beech
Song lives in singing nightingales
And in a woman’s speech

To hear her whisper in the dark
'Tis heavens melody
Her calm reply her wise remark
Is more than song to me

The harp can touch no sweeter chord
In music's thrilling choice
Nor music breathe a sweeter word
Than comes from woman’s voice

There's music in the singing lark
That carols to the sky
To hear her whisper in the dark
'Tis heavens melody

There's music in a woman’s voice
While sitting on your knee
And Emma is my own heart's choice
When e'er she chooses me

The Mock Bird

I've often tried, when tending sheep and cow,
With bits of grass and peels of oaten straw,
To whistle like the birds. The thrush would start
To hear her song, and pause, and fly away;
The blackbird never cared, but sang again;
The nightingale's fine song I could not try;
And when the thrush would mock her song, she paused,
And sang another song no bird could do!
She sang when all were done, and beat them all.
I've often sat and mocked them half the day,
Behind the hedge-row, thorn, or bullace tree:
I thought how nobly I could act in crowds.
The woods and fields were all the books I knew,
And every leisure thought was Love and Fame.

When gentle even oer the wild scene creeping

When gentle even oer the wild scene creeping
Lays labour down free from his care
& the moons silver pencil nights landscape is sweeping
On the tree heads & thro mountains tops peeping
As fair as sweet woman is fair

When the lone night bird his love song is breathing
& his sorrow melts sweet on the ear
& the blew mist round the horison wreathing
On the moist cheek & the still bough is [sweep]ing
As sweetly as kind warming tear

While the wild night wind his love tidings hushes
As a watch nurse oer her childs [closing eye]
Whispering soft thro the trees & the bushes
While the brooke oer its [mountain] bed murmuring gushes
As soft as a sweet womans sigh

O blest at that hour when the [doves tribes] are snoozing
[As morn] with sweet [blushes o] care
When the Nights fears in the moon light is loosing
& gilds sweet the snow of her soft heaving bosom
Sure never seems woman so fair

But sad at that hour is fond lovers meeting
& fate frowning fate [hovers] near
Forcd from each other fond vows soft repeating
To part & perchance never more to be meeting
How dearer then life is sweet womans tear

When gentle eve in nights lap is desarting
& sinking moon dims in the eye
When modesty wispers its leave to be parting
When love seals a vow on their lips at departing
How sweet is the good womans sigh

Native Scenes (click here)

[Near Torpel Manor Field just outside Helpston]

O native scenes for ever ever dear
So blest so happy where I long have been
So charmd with nature in each varied scene
To leave ye all is cutting & severe
Ye hanging bushes that from winds woud screen
Where oft Ive shelterd from an aprils shower
In youths past bliss in Childhoods happy hour
Ye Woods Ive wanderd searching out the nest
Ye Meadows gay that reard me many a flower
Culling my cow slips Ive been doubly blest
Huming gay fancies As I bound the prize
O Fate unkind beloved scenes adieu
Your vanishd pleasures crowd my swimming eyes
& makes this wounded heart to bleed anew

To Anna, three years old

My Anna, summer laughs in mirth,
And we will of the party be,
And leave the crickets in the hearth
For green fields' merry minstrelsy.

I see thee now with little hand
Catch at each object passing by,
The happiest thing in all the land
Except the bee and butterfly.

The weed-based arches' walls that stride
O'er where the meadow water falls
Will turn thee from thy path aside
To gaze upon the mossy walls.

And limpid brook that leaps along,
Gilt with the summer's burnished gleam,
Will stop thy little tale or song
To gaze upon its crimping stream.

Thou'lt leave my hand with eager speed
The new-discovered things to see—
The old pond with its water-weed
And danger-daring willow-tree,
Who leans, an ancient invalid,
O'er spots where deepest waters be.

In sudden shout and wild surprise
I hear thy simple wonderment,
As new things meet thy childish eyes
And wake some innocent intent.

As bird or bee or butterfly
Bounds through the crowd of merry leaves
And starts the rapture of thine eye
To run for what it ne'er achieves.

The simple reasoning arguments
Shaped to thy fancy's little view,
The joys and rapturous intents
That everywhere pursue.

So dreamed I over hope's young boon,
When merry summer was returning,
And little thought that time so soon
Would change my early hope to mourning.

I thought to have heard thee mid the bowers
To mock the cuckoo's merry song,
And see thee seek thy daisy flowers
That's been thy anxious choice so long.

But thou art on the bed of pain,
So tells each poor forsaken toy.
Ah, could I see that happy hour
When these shall be thy heart's employ,
And see thee toddle o'er the plain,
And stoop for flowers, and shout for joy.

When with our little ones we spent

When with our little ones we spent
Each Sunday after tea,

And up the wood's dark side we went
Or pasture's rushy lea,

To look among the woodland boughs
To find the bird's retreat,

Or crop the cowslip for the cows;
Then sat to rest the little feet
In many a pleasant place,
And see the lambs, who tried to bleat,
Come first in every race,
Then laugh'd the children's joys to view,
Who ran across the lea
At birds that from the rushes flew,
And many a wandering bee.

Great Casterton

Ronald Blythe deep in conversation with David Rowe in the garden of the Crown Inn, Great Casterton just opposite the church in which Clare and Patty were married in March 1820. David sang two of Clare's poems - 'Maid of Walkherd' and 'The Courtship' as part of the presentation of poems, songs and readings in the Church. It is hoped that these songs will form part of a Clare CD in the near future. At present I can offer a 'Demo' recording of David's settings of 9 of Clare's poems for the princely sum of £3-00.

A womans is the dearest love
Theres nought on earth sincerer
The leisure upon beautys breast
Can any thing be dearer

I saw her love in beauty’s face
I saw her in the rose
I saw her in the fairest flowers
In every weed that grows

(from 'The Courtship')

Summer Heat at Helpston

Back from Helpston and lovely three days of Festival. Although the heat was quite oppressive, the programme and fellow Society members were at their stimulating best.

Theres beauty in the intercourse of nature with her kind
Then come my dear Miss W--- and hear the sueing wind
That will not let thy hair alone, for all its glossy curls
But blows it in disorder like a string of broken pearls
That winnows round thy snowy neck to cool the summer heat
I wish I was the wind myself that kisses one so sweet
.

(from "To Miss W---") excerpt.

My love's like a lily my love's like a rose

For my final posting before the Festival starts on Friday lunchtime in Helpston, a lovely poem from Clare's youthful courting of Patty. Published in "Poems Descriptive of Rural Life & Scenery" in the Spring of 1820. Clare and Patty were married on the 20th March, 1820 in Bridge Casterton Church. On Saturday afternoon, the 10th July, we will be re-visiting the church in the village -- now called Great Casterton.

My love’s like a lily my loves like a rose
My love’s like a smile the spring morning’s disclose
And sweet as the rose on her cheek—her love glows
When sweetly she smileth on me

& as cold as the snow of the lily—my rose
Behaves to pretenders who ever they be
In vain higher stations their passions disclose
To win her affections from me

My love’s like the lily my love’s like the rose
My love’s like the smile the spring morning’s disclose
& fine as the lily & sweet as the rose
My loves beauty bloometh to me

& smiles of more pleasure my heart only knows
To think that pretenders who ever they be
But vainly their love & their passions disclose
My love remains constant to me

July - The Shepherds Calendar

Image: “Summer Parish” by Carry Akroyd*

The weary thresher leaves his barn
And emptys from his shoes the corn

That gatherd in them thro the day
And homward bends his weary way

The gardener he is sprinkling showers
From watering pans on drooping flowers

And set away his hoe and spade
While goody neath the cottage shade

Sits wi a baskett tween her knees
Ready for supper shelling peas

And cobler chatting in the town
Hath put his window shutter down

And the knowing parish clerk
Feign to do his jobs ere dark

Hath timd the church clock to the sun
And wound it up for night and done

And turnd the hugh kee in the door
Chatting his evening story oer

Up the street the servant maid
Runs wi her errands long delayd

And ere the door she enters in
She stops to right a loosend pin

And smooth wi hasty fingers down
The crumpling creases in her gown

Which Rogers oggles rudly made
For may games forfeit never paid

And seizd a kiss against her will
While playing quoits upon the hill

Wi other shepherds laughing nigh
That made her shoy and hurry bye

(lines 621-650)

* Carry Akroyd will be signing her new book “Landscape Change, John Clare and me” at Annakin’s Art Shop in Helpston on the 10th July -- during the John Clare Festival]

Helpstone

Hail, humble Helpstone ! where thy vallies spread,
And thy mean village lifts its lowly head ;
Unknown to grandeur, and unknown to fame;
No minstrel boasting to advance thy name :
Unletter'd spot! unheard in poets' song;
Where bustling labour drives the hours along ;
Where dawning genius never met the day;
Where useless ignorance slumbers life away ;
Unknown nor heeded, where, low genius tries
Above the vulgar and the vain to rise.

John Clare Festival 2010

We seem as startled from unnatural dreams
To hear the summer voice of woods and streams
And feel the sunny air, right green and young
Breathe music round as though a siren sung
(from 'Old Poesy - II')

9 July (Friday)
1.30 pm at Helpston Parish Church – the Midsummer Cushion Ceremony. Pupils from the John Clare Primary School place these cushions of flowers around Clare’s grave. The pupils’ prize winning poems are read and prizes awarded.

6 pm – Guided walk around Helpston. Meet at the Butter Cross.

7 pm onwards – The Langdyke Trust. Official opening of the heritage site at Torpel Manor Field, part of Helpston’s history since the Norman Conquest. The Trust will be hosting a range of walks and talks based on the history of the site from 7 pm onwards.

7.30 pm to 11 pm – Folk Music. John Clare’s Birthday Music and Song Session – an informal evening in the front room of the Exeter Arms, 3 Church Lane, Helpston – free admission – limited space, so arrive in good time – musicians and singers especially welcome – details 01778 571563 or pete@peteshaw.co.uk.

10 July (Saturday)
From 9.30 am – coffee and toast in the Botolphs Barn – near the Exeter Arms!

10 am – Festival opens in the School Hall - stalls include the J C Society sales, booksellers, local tourist offices, and exhibitions. Buy your tickets for the afternoon coach tour or the evening performance of John Clare and the music of what happens.

10 am – in the marquee – behind the School – St Botolphs Music Group will play before the meeting starts.

10.30 am – in the marquee – welcome and introduction to the Festival, followed by the AGM of the JC Society.

11.15 am – the President’s Address by Ronald Blythe.

From 11 am – An artists quarter in Botolphs Barn.

12 noon – 1 pm and 1.30 pm to 2.30 pm – poetry workshops in the Scout and Guide Centre – for children aged 6 to 12 years, led by Keely Mills and Luke Payn.

Lunches in the Village Hall
John Clare cottage open 10 am to 5 pm

Botolphs Barn – artists and crafts

Bluebell and Exeter Arms – morris dancers and the Peterborough Folk Dance Society perform

Carry Akroyd will be signing her book at Annakin’s Art Shop (near the village shop and post office on West Street) – for more on Carry, visit www.carryakroyd.co.uk.

1.45 pm – The Poet’s Wife – Judith Allnatt, poet and writer will talk about her recently published book, a reimagining of the life of John Clare through the eyes of his wife, Patty. Judith will be ready to sign books and discuss the novel with any who wish to stay after her talk.

3 pm – coach outing to Great Casterton (tickets available from 10am) and the church where John & Martha (Patty) Clare were married, including a programme of prose, poetry and song by Clare.

3 pm – guided walks around Helpston – meet at the Butter Cross.

3.15 pm – 4 pm – in the Church, read your favourite poem

Enjoy a traditional English tea in the village hall

5.30 pm – in the Church – another chance to read your favourite Clare poem!

7 pm – in the marquee at the John Clare Primary School (by ticket only) – 'John Clare and the music of what happens', poet Malcolm Guite and Jazz Poetry Collective Riprap explore the contemporary resonances of John Clare’s poetry (tickets £10 and £8 concessions).

From 7.30 pm onwards – in the Blue Bell, Frumenty perform a selection of music, including songs about Clare. Frumenty are a three piece band encompassing guitars, mandolin, mandola, banjo and percussion as well as vocals and singing a range of traditional and contemporary folk music.

11 July (Sunday)

11 a.m. – special church service at St Botolphs, led by the Rev Ron Ingamells, Vice Chair of the Society.

For more detail leave a comment on this weblog.

The Meadow Flags

The meadow flags now rustle bleached & dank
& misted oer with down as fine as dew
The sloe & dewberry shine along the bank
Where weeds in blooms luxuriance lately grew
Red rose the sun & up the morehen flew
From bank to bank the meadow arches stride
Where foamy floods in winter tumbles through
& spread a restless ocean foaming wide
Where now the cowboys sleep nor fear the coming tide

(Child Harold lines 714-722)

Ballad - The Rose of the World...

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 Where 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 Hearts Affections Would Be

I Told her in love that all nature was true
I convinced her that nature was kind
But love in his trials had labour to do
<        > Mary would be in the mind

Mary met me in spring where the speedwell knots grew
& the king cups were shining like flame
I chose her all colours red yellow & blue
But my love was one hue & the same

Spring summer & winter & all the year through
In the sunshine the shower & the blast
I told the same tale & she knows it all true
& Mary's my blossom at last

(Child Harold – lines 1139-1158)

(In this poem, written early in 1841, Clare stops capitalising every word. No-one knows why he started, or stopped, this practice).  The first word of line 12 is a blank in the manuscript.

The Wild Rose

The hedge rose blossoms like thy face
Sweet red and white together
And shadows wave about the place
Where branches twist together

The leaves dance to a merry tune
And boughs wave like to billows
A flowry carpet throughout june
And concert in the willows

Dews bead the headaches like to gems
And corn blades like to rain
God's love does nothing here condemn
All live free from sins pain

Then let us meet at dewy morn
Or else at golden noon
Or evening mid the waving corn
Or night while shines the moon

The hedge row was our tristing place
Beside the rose tree fair
There nature smiled on thy sweet face
The fairest wild rose there

Two Summer Sonnets

June
Go where I will, naught but delight is seen;
The blue and luscious sky is one broad gleam
Of universal ecstasy; the green,
Rich, sweeping meadows and the laughing stream,
As sweet as happiness on heaven's breast,
Lie listening to the never-ceasing song
That day or night ne'er wearies into rest
But hums unceasingly the summer long.
The very grass, to music's rapture stirred,
Dances before the breeze's wanton wing,
While every bush stirs with a startled bird
Who eager wakes morn's dewy praise to sing.
Yet mid this summer glee I cannot borrow
One joy, for sadness chills them all to sorrow.

Summer Amusements
I love to hide me on a spot that lies
In solitudes where footsteps find no track
To make intrusions; there to sympathize
With nature: often gazing on the rack
That veils the blueness of the summer skies
In rich varieties; or o'er the grass
Behold the spangled crowds of butterflies
Flutter from flower to flower, and things that pass
In urgent travel by my still retreat,
The bustling beetle tribes; and up the stem
Of bents see lady-cows with nimble feet
Climb tall church-steeple heights—or more to them—
Till at its quaking top they take their seat,
Which bows, and off they fly fresh happiness to meet.

The humble flower...

(A carpet of wild flowers growing in Swaddywell, July 2005)

The humble flowers that buds upon the plain
& only buds to blossom but in vain
By sensless rustics with unheeding eyes
Still troden down as they attempt to rise
So like the humble blossom of the Fields
Unculturd Genius humble life consceals

The Flitting (final)

And why? this shepherd's purse that grows
In this strange spot, in days gone by
Grew in the little garden rows
Of my old home now left; and I
Feel what I never felt before,
This weed an ancient neighbour here,
And though I own the spot no more
Its every trifle makes it dear.

The ivy at the parlour end,
The woodbine at the garden gate,
Are all and each affection's friend
That rendered parting desolate.
But times will change and friends must part,
And nature still can make amends;
Their memory lingers round the heart
Like life, whose essence is its friends.

Time looks on pomp with vengeful mood
Or killing apathy's disdain;
So where old marble cities stood
Poor persecuted weeds remain.
She feels a love for little things
That very few can feel beside,
And still the grass eternal springs
Where castles stood and grandeur died.

The Flitting (penultimate)

I love the verse that, mild and bland,
Breathes of green fields and open sky,
I love the muse that in her hand
Bears flowers of native poesy;
Who walks nor skips the pasture brook
In scorn, but by the drinking horse
Leans o'er its little brig to look
How far the sallows lean across.

And feels a rapture in her breast
Upon their root-fringed grains to mark
A hermit moor-hen's sedgy nest
Just like a naiad's summer bark.
She counts the eggs she cannot reach,
Admires the spot and loves it well,
And yearns, so nature's lessons teach,
Amid such neighbourhoods to dwell.

I love the muse who sits her down
Upon the mole-hill's little lap,
Who feels no fear to stain her gown
And pauses by the hedgerow gap;
Not with that affectation, praise
Of song, to sing and never see
A field flower grow in all her days
Or e'en a forest's aged tree.

E'en here my simple feelings nurse
A love for every simple weed,
And e'en this little shepherd's purse
Grieves me to cut it up; indeed
I feel at times a love and joy
For every weed and every thing,
A feeling kindred from a boy,
A feeling brought with every spring.

(tbc)

The Flitting (V)

No, pasture mole-hills used to lie
And talk to me of sunny days,
And then the glad sheep resting by
All still in ruminating praise
Of summer and the pleasant place;
And every weed and blossom too
Was looking upward in my face
With friendship's welcome ‘How do ye do?’

All tenants of an ancient place
And heirs of noble heritage,
Coeval they with Adam's race
And blest with more substantial age.
For when the world first saw the sun
These little flowers beheld him too,
And when his love for earth begun
They were the first his smiles to woo.

There little lambtoe bunches springs
In red-tinged and begolden dye
For ever, and like China kings
They come but never seem to die.
There may-bloom with its little threads
Still comes upon the thorny bowers
And ne'er forgets those pinky heads
Like fairy pins amid the flowers.

And still they bloom as on the day
They first crowned wilderness and rock,
When Abel haply wreathed with may
The firstlings of his little flock,
And Eve might from the matted thorn
To deck her lone and lovely brow
Reach that same rose that heedless scorn
Misnames as the dog rosey now.

Give me no high-flown fangled things,
No haughty pomp in marching chime,
Where muses play on golden strings
And splendour passes for sublime,
Where cities stretch as far as fame
And fancy's straining eye can go,
And piled until the sky for shame
Is stooping far away below.

(tbc)

The Flitting (IV)

Strange scenes mere shadows are to me,
Vague impersonifying things;
I love with my old haunts to be
By quiet woods and gravel springs,
Where little pebbles wear as smooth
As hermits' beads by gentle floods,
Whose noises do my spirits soothe
And warm them into singing moods.

Here every tree is strange to me,
All foreign things where'er I go,
There's none where boyhood made a swee
Or clambered up to rob a crow.
No hollow tree or woodland bower
Well known when joy was beating high,
Where beauty ran to shun a shower
And love took pains to keep her dry.

And laid the sheaf upon the ground
To keep her from the dripping grass,
And ran for stooks and set them round
Till scarce a drop of rain could pass
Through; where the maidens they reclined
And sung sweet ballads now forgot,
Which brought sweet memories to the mind,
But here no memory knows them not.

There have I sat by many a tree
And leaned o'er many a rural stile,
And conned my thoughts as joys to me,
Naught heeding who might frown or smile.
'Twas nature's beauty that inspired
My heart with raptures not its own,
And she's a fame that never tires;
How could I feel myself alone?

(tbc)

The Flitting (III)

The hawthorns here were hung with may,
But still they seem in deader green,
The sun e'en seems to lose its way
Nor knows the quarter it is in.
I dwell on trifles like a child,
I feel as ill becomes a man,
And still my thoughts like weedlings wild
Grow up to blossom where they can.

They turn to places known so long
I feel that joy was dwelling there,
So home-fed pleasures fill the song
That has no present joys to heir.
I read in books for happiness,
But books are like the sea to joy;
They change—as well give age the glass
To hunt its visage when a boy.

For books they follow fashions new
And throw all old esteems away,
In crowded streets flowers never grew,
But many there hath died away.
Some sing the pomps of chivalry
As legends of the ancient time,
Where gold and pearls and mystery
Are shadows painted for sublime.

But passions of sublimity
Belong to plain and simpler things,
And David underneath a tree
Sought when a shepherd Salem's springs,
Where moss did into cushions spring,
Forming a seat of velvet hue,
A small unnoticed trifling thing
To all but heaven's hailing dew.

And David's crown hath passed away,
Yet poesy breathes his shepherd-skill,
His palace lost—and to this day
The little moss is blooming still.

(tbc)

The Flitting (II)

I walk adown the narrow lane,
The nightingale is singing now,
But like to me she seems at loss
For Royce Wood and its shielding bough.

I lean upon the window-sill,
The trees and summer happy seem;
Green, sunny green they shine, but still
My heart goes far away to dream
Of happiness, and thoughts arise
With home-bred pictures many a one,
Green lanes that shut out burning skies
And old crook'd stiles to rest upon.

Above them hangs the maple tree,
Below grass swells a velvet hill,
And little footpaths sweet to see
Go seeking sweeter places still,
With by and by a brook to cross
O'er which a little arch is thrown:
No brook is here, I feel the loss
From home and friends and all alone.

The stone pit with its shelvy sides
Seemed hanging rocks in my esteem;
I miss the prospect far and wide
From Langley Bush, and so I seem
Alone and in a stranger scene,
Far, far from spots my heart esteems,
The closen with their ancient green,
Heaths, woods, and pastures' sunny streams.

The Flitting (I)

I've left my own old home of homes,
Green fields and every pleasant place;
The summer like a stranger comes,
I pause and hardly know her face.
I miss the hazel's happy green,
The bluebell's quiet hanging blooms,
Where envy's sneer was never seen,
Where staring malice never comes.

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

I sit me in my corner chair
That seems to feel itself from home,
And hear bird music here and there
From hawthorn hedge and orchard come;
I hear, but all is strange and new:
I sat on my old bench in June,
The sailing puddock's shrill ‘peelew’
On Royce Wood seemed a sweeter tune.

(tbc)

Native Scenes

O native scenes for ever, ever dear
So blest so happy where I long have been
So charmd with nature in each varied scene
To leave ye all is cutting & severe

Ye hanging bushes that from winds woud screen
Where oft I've shelterd from an april's shower
In youths past bliss in Childhoods happy hour
Ye Woods I've wanderd searching out the nest

Ye Meadows gay that reard me many a flower
Culling my cow slips I've been doubly blest
Huming gay fancies As I bound the prize
O Fate unkind beloved scenes adieu
Your vanishd pleasures crowd my swimming eyes
& makes this wounded heart to bleed anew

May

Image: 'The Shepherd's Calendar ~ May' by Carry Akroyd

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

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
& ere the april time is out
Along the ridings gravel walk
The bedlam primrose blooms about
Wi' twenty blossoms on a stalk
How happy seems the drop of dew
That nestles in the daiseys eye
How blest the cloud seems in the blue
That near the sun appears to lie
How happy does thy shadows seem
That stretches oer the morning grass
They seeims to walk as in a dream
I know their shadows as they pass
The primrose over withered leaves
Now beautifully shines

Mary, Mary, charming Mary

[Image: ‘Wet Meadow’ by Carry Akroyd]

Mary, Mary, charming Mary
Now the sun has sunk to rest
& the even breeze so airy
Tries to bare thy snowy breast —
How I love wi thee to wander
Mary O how sweet wi thee,
Dusky meadows to meander
Where no soul can hear or see.

As we pause by lake or fountain
On thy bosom bending free
Ah how sweet sensations counting
When I know each throbs for me —
As thy face turns on the azure
Looking where the moon may dwell,
As I fold thy beauty’s treasure
Wheres the kiss can taste so well.

As the hour of even closes
& my lingering wi thy charms
Plants thy cheek wi maiden roses
& thy modesty alarms —
Who sweet girl could not adore thee
& tho beauty thee has blest,
When that modesty comes o’er thee
Prove that virtue pleases best.

The Swallow

Pretty swallow, once again
Come and pass me in the rain.
Pretty swallow, why so shy?
Pass again my window by.

The horsepond where he dips his wings,
The wet day prints it full of rings.
The raindrops on his [........] track
Lodge like pearls upon his back.

Then again he dips his wing
In the wrinkles of the spring,
Then oer the rushes flies again,
And pearls roll off his back like rain.

Pretty little swallow, fly
Village doors and windows by,
Whisking oer the garden pales
Where the blackbird finds the snails;

Whewing by the ladslove tree
For something only seen by thee;
Pearls that on the red rose hing
Fall off shaken by thy wing.

On that low thatched cottage stop,
In the sooty chimney pop,
Where thy wife and family
Every evening wait for thee.

Land of perpetual summer, Italy

Land of perpetual summer, Italy
Land of the golden City of the sun
Cradle of Europe’s Empire — but for thee
The rest were darkness & perpetual dun
Celestial clime & garden of the sun

Country of Virgil Hessiod — once the free
Latium & Greece both kingdoms of the sun
Their infant cradles rocked by Liberty
& still the sunniest Land is Italy

Greece Land of Homer & the muses fire
How nations read & kindle at thy name
The freeman’s sword the poet’s native lyre
Have filled thy history with a classic fame
& is not Greece, that Land of Isles, the same?

The sun shines o’er its freedom & wars cease
The despot’s chains near made it stoop to shame
Its hills & classic skys repose in peace
& freedom owns it as the soil of Greece

An early Northampton Asylum poem from 1842
(for Simona in Ancona, in the “Land of perpetual summer”)

Early Nightingale

When first we hear the shy-come nightingales,
They seem to mutter oer their songs in fear,
And, climb we eer so soft the spinney rails,
All stops as if no bird was anywhere.
The kindled bushes with the young leaves thin
Let curious eyes to search a long way in,
Until impatience cannot see or hear
The hidden music; gets but little way
Upon the path--when up the songs begin,
Full loud a moment and then low again.
But when a day or two confirms her stay
Boldly she sings and loud for half the day;
And soon the village brings the woodman's tale
Of having heard the newcome nightingale.

A Special Posting... via YouTube

The Dying Child
"He could not die when trees were green,
For he loved the time too well.
His little hands, when flowers were seen,
Were held for the bluebell,
As he was carried oer the green."

His eye glanced at the white-nosed bee;
He knew those children of the Spring:
When he was well and on the lea
He held one in his hands to sing,
Which filled his heart with glee.

"Infants, the children of the Spring!
How can an infant die
When butterflies are on the wing,
Green grass, and such a sky?
How can they die at Spring?"

"He held his hands for daisies white,
And then for violets blue,
And took them all to bed at night
That in the green fields grew,
As childhood's sweet delight."

And then he shut his little eyes,
And flowers would notice not;
Birds' nests and eggs caused no surprise,
He now no blossoms got:
They met with plaintive sighs.

"When Winter came and blasts did sigh,
And bare were plain and tree,
As he for ease in bed did lie
His soul seemed with the free,
He died so quietly."

The reunitying of two poets

On a day of quite exceptional political shenanigans came the quiet statement that Ted Hughes is to be memorialised in Poets’ Corner. He and I took part in a wonderful event there: the inclusion of John Clare, this country’s finest rural voice.

It was in 1989, and the Abbey was filled with writers. Ted read Clare’s “The Nightingale’s Nest”, and I described his life. The stone was next to that of Matthew Arnold.

In March 1820, Clare had stood there on his first visit to London. His first book of poems had been published and he was fêted. Never again. A marvellous range of poetry would succeed it, but he himself would be out of sight. The tragi-triumph of his existence makes a famous story.

But at this moment in 1989, Ted and I are with Dean Mayne, and full of gratitude for his making this event possible.

Michael Mayne and I had met in Cambridge when he was Vicar of Great St Mary’s and liked to have writers preach at evensong. And Ted and I had met at the Roundhouse when we gave readings, I of Thomas Hardy and he of his own work. We used to have coffee at the ice-cream shop afterwards.

When Michael left Cambridge for Westminster Abbey, I would sometimes stay with him and Alison, and he would use the ancient Jerusalem Chamber for poetry readings. He was a genius who brought a fresh “literary” spirituality into the Abbey, both with his own writing and with George Herbert, etc.

On the day we celebrated Clare’s entrance to Poets’ Corner, I made what the children of Helpston, his Northamptonshire village, called a Midsummer Cushion. This was a square of turf stuck with wild flowers. I took it from the Stour Valley to Westminster Deanery in a carrier bag. It weighed a ton.

The Helpston schoolchildren brought flowers that had descended from those the great poet would have seen. And Ted drew the veil from the carved stone. And we all sang Clare’s sad hymn, “A stranger once did bless the Earth”. It would seem to speak of the vagabondage of Christ. Clare was homeless in “homes” for the mad.

Ted’s work is infused with natural history, and when he read Clare’s “The Nightingale’s Nest”, a poem in which a correct ornithology is fed into his own youthful experience on nesting, and the abandonment of such unkindness, he did so quite unforgettably. No one ever forgot a Ted Hughes reading — the rich voice, the perfect inflection.

And now his name calls out near Clare’s. Or soon will do. When I was with Michael, all the wall and floor-space had been used up by writers, and they had taken to the windows, where some missed-out poets, Oscar Wilde and Robert Herrick, were engraved.

This corner in the south transept is probably the most popular in the Abbey. A Tudor undergraduate started it. Wandering around, he had come across a pile of bones, dust, and armorials, all in a heap, and was shocked to find that they were Geoffrey Chaucer’s. So he reinterred them in the beautiful Purbeck marble altar-tomb, paying for it himself. Edmund Spenser would soon follow, and then nearly all Eng. Lit.

Clare’s body lies in Helpston churchyard. On 13 July, his birthday, it is carpeted with Midsummer Cushions. Once, when asked where he got his poetry, he said he kicked it out of the fields.

Ronald Blythe
Word from Wormingford
Church Times ~ 1st April 2010

April

Image: 'The Shepherd's Calendar ~ April’ by Carry Akroyd

The infant april joins the spring
And views its watery skye
As youngling linnet trys its wing
And fears at first to flye
With timid step she ventures on
And hardly dares to smile
The blossoms open one by one
And sunny hours beguile
But finer days approacheth yet
With scenes more sweet to charm
And suns arive that rise and set
Bright strangers to a storm
And as the birds with louder song
Each mornings glory cheers
With bolder step she speeds along
And looses all her fears
In wanton gambols like a child
She tends her early toils
And seeks the buds along the wild
That blossom while she smiles
And laughing on with nought to chide
She races with the hours
Or sports by natures lovley side
And fills her lap with flowers

(lines 1-24)

Spring (two versions)

SPRING (a)
Welcome gentle breathing Spring
Now the birds are heard to sing
And the budding tree is seen
Putting forth her tender green
O delightful season hail
May my footsteps never fail
When time permits to visit thee
And view thy new born scenery

SPRING (b)
Welcome gentle breathing spring
Now the birds begin to sing
Now the Swelling shade is seen
Putting forth its tender green
While the Suns extended way
Sweetly shows the lengthend day
O delightful Season hail
May my footsteps never fail
When I've time to trample where
All thy beauties reappear

Child Harold (again)

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

(Lines 966-974)

Ballad

I have been researching poems for the Festival in July, and have rediscovered this lovely song, part of the long series of 1841 Clare entitled "Child Harold". It dates from early in that year as the scholars tell us that at that time Clare was capitalising every word in his manuscript(s), no-one knows why. It's only title is 'Ballad'... my current favourite.

The Blackbird Has Built In The Pasture Agen
& The Thorn Oer The Pond Shows A Delicate Green
Where I Strolled With Patty Adown In The Glen
& Spent Summer Evenings & Sundays Unseen

How Sweet The Hill Brow
& The Low Of The Cow
& The Sunshine That Gilded The Bushes So Green

When Evening Brought Dews Natures Thirst To Allay
& Clouds Seemed To Nestle Round Hamlets & Farms
While In The Green Bushes We Spent The Sweet Day
& Patty, Sweet Patty, Was Still In My Arms

The Love Bloom That Redded Upon Her Sweet Lips
The Love Light That Glistened Within Her Sweet Eye
The Singing Bees There That The Wild Honey Sips
From Wild Blossoms Seemed Not So Happy As I

How Sweet Her Smile Seemed
While The Summer Sun Gleamed
& The Laugh Of The Spring Shadowed Joys From On High

While The Birds Sung About Us & Cattle Grazed Round
& Beauty Was Blooming On Hamlets & Farms
How Sweet Steamed The Inscence Of Dew From The Ground
While Patty Sweet Patty Sat Locked In My Arms

(lines 1108-1129 : Child Harold)

A Hunt for Dobin or the Force of Love

(lines 222-235)

The old deep pond where the coy morehen lyes
Where on whose side the turfy hillocks rise
Where the broad flag and fuzy bulrush grows
Curving adown to the least wind that blows
And where surrounding bushes form a shade
As wild as ever was by nature made
The oaken folliage shaken by the wind
The dark green ivy round their trunks entwind
With all the mingling many shaded greens
That decorate the woodlands mixing scenes
These are the haunts & these the scenes so wild
Which are so dear to Natures every child
To sport in wildness nature dearly loves
And all her Children of her taste approves

I love the little pond...

I love the little pond to mark at spring
When frogs & toads are croaking round its brink
When blackbirds yellow bills gin first to sing
& green woodpecker rotten trees to clink
I love to see the cattle muse & drink
& water crinkle to the rude march wind
While two ash dotterels flourish on its brink
Bearing key bunches children run to find
& water buttercups they're forced to leave behind

Somthing New

How varying is the taste of man
Still eager to pursue
That ever pleasing novelty
In meeting somthing new

In infancy the rage begins
(So tempting is the view)
Babes throw aside their once lov'd things
To sigh for somthing new

The hoop to day which boys are seen
So eager to pursue
To morrow lies a toy despis'd
Exchang'd for somthing new

Young miss's (if not catch'd in time)
—Be lovers ere so true
Grow fickle tires & turns 'em off
To seek for somthing new

Old maids whom every hope forsakes
The self same end pursue
& put their wrinkl'd mouths in form
To look for somthing new

E'en wives—but hasty muse for bear
(Tho wives shou'd have their due)
Will often harbour evil thoughts
& wish for somthing new

Lawers & doctors each in turn
One common aim pursue
When one good job is finish'd they
Look out for somthing new


Poor victim poets vainly priz'd
By the diserning few
Still ryhme in hopes o' better days
& dwell on somthing new

—Ah shatter'd coat & wanted groat
When wil't be mine to view?
Thee thrown aside? & pockets lin'd
With hopefull somthing new

—Booksellers often miss the chance
Their customers pursue
When throwing usless books about
They search for somthing new

Tho fashions change with every day
Their votaries will pursue
Come as they will or fast or slow
They cry is ‘somthing new’

So Gentlemen & ladies here
(In hopes to meet his due)
A humble clown exerts his skill
To offer somthing new

He wishes every taste to please
& hopes to find it true
So good or bad or what they will
This “Trifle’s” somthing new

When I met wi her...

When I met wi her I coud wish for my own
As fair & as blushing as blossoms full blown
Ah me I did heave a sigh
When she first met my eye
Poverty frownd she shoud not be my own

Life had a cloud that was sore to be nigh
Were hot love wi want woud get colded & dye
When I my love did meet
& saw her face so sweet
Poverty frownd wi many a sigh

Ah how I wishd the sweet maid for my own
Ah how I sighd upon troubles long known
But her sweet simple smile
Poverty did beguile
& hazard at last took the maid for my own

The Shepherd's Calendar - March

[Image: 'March' by Carry Akroyd]

March month of ‘many weathers’ wildly comes
In hail and snow and rain and threatning hums
And floods: while often at his cottage door
The shepherd stands to hear the distant roar
Loosd from the rushing mills and river locks
Wi thundering sound and over powering shocks
And headlong hurry thro the meadow brigs
Brushing the leaning willows fingering twigs
In feathery foam and eddy hurryng chase
Rolling a storm oertaken travellers pace
From bank to bank along the meadow leas
Spreading and shining like to little seas
While in the pale sunlight a watery brood
Of swopping white birds flock about the flood

(lines 1-14)