begins in Southern England on the 14th April, on which date the Old Woman lets the Cuckoo out of her basket at Heathfield Fair – locally known as Heffle Cuckoo Fair.
Tell it to the locked-up trees,
Cuckoo, bring your song here!
Warrant, Act and Summons, please.
For Spring to pass along here!
Tell old Winter, if he doubt,
Tell him squat and square – a!
Old Woman!
Old Woman!
Old Woman's let the Cuckoo out
At Heffle Cuckoo Fair – a!
March has searched and April tried —
'Tisn't long to May now,
Not so far to Whitsuntide,
And Cuckoo's come to stay now!
Hear the valiant fellow shout
Down the orchard bare – a!
Old Woman!
Old Woman!
Old Woman's let the Cuckoo out
At Heffle Cuckoo Fair – a!
When your heart is young and gay
And the season rules it —
Work your works and play your play
'Fore the Autumn cools it!
Kiss you turn and turn about,
But my lad, beware – a!
Old Woman!
Old Woman!
Old Woman's let the Cuckoo out
At Heffle Cuckoo Fair – a!
A CHARM
Take of English earth as much
As either hand may rightly clutch.
In the taking of it breathe
Prayer for all who lie beneath.
Not the great nor well-bespoke,
But the mere uncounted folk
Of whose life and death is none
Report or lamentation.
Lay that earth upon thy heart,
And thy sickness shall depart!
It shall sweeten and make whole
Fevered breath and festered soul.
It shall mightily restrain
Over-busy hand and brain.
It shall ease thy mortal strife
'Gainst the immortal woe of life,
Till thyself restored shall prove
By what grace the Heavens do move.
Take of English flowers these —
Spring's full-facèd primroses,
Summer's wild wide-hearted rose,
Autumn's wall-flower of the close,
And, thy darkness to illume,
Winter's bee-thronged ivy-bloom.
Seek and serve them where they bide
From Candlemas to Christmas-tide,
For these simples, used aright,
Can restore a failing sight.
These shall cleanse and purify
Webbed and inward-turning eye;
These shall show thee treasure hid,
Thy familiar fields amid;
And reveal (which is thy need)
Every man a King indeed!
THE PRAIRIE
'I see the grass shake in the sun for leagues on either hand,
I see a river loop and run about a treeless land —
An empty plain, a steely pond, a distance diamond-clear,
And low blue naked hills beyond. And what is that to fear?'
'Go softly by that river-side or, when you would depart,
You'll find its every winding tied and knotted round your heart.
Be wary as the seasons pass, or you may ne'er outrun
The wind that sets that yellowed grass a-shiver 'neath the Sun.'
'I hear the summer storm outblown – the drip of the grateful wheat.
I hear the hard trail telephone a far-off horse's feet.
I hear the horns of Autumn blow to the wild-fowl overhead;
And I hear the hush before the snow. And what is that to dread?'
'Take heed what spell the lightning weaves – what charm the echoes shape —
Or, bound among a million sheaves, your soul may not escape.
Bar home the door of summer nights lest those high planets drown
The memory of near delights in all the longed-for town.'
'What need have I to long or fear? Now, friendly, I behold
My faithful seasons robe the year in silver and in gold.
Now I possess and am possessed of the land where I would be,
And the curve of half Earth's generous breast shall soothe and ravish me!'
CHAPTER HEADINGS
Look, you have cast out Love! What Gods are these
You bid me please?
The Three in One, the One in Three? Not so!
To my own Gods I go.
It may be they shall give me greater ease
Than your cold Christ and tangled Trinities.
Lispeth.
When the Earth was sick and the Skies were grey,
And the woods were rotted with rain,
The Dead Man rode through the autumn day
To visit his love again.
His love she neither saw nor heard,
So heavy was her shame;
And tho' the babe within her stirred
She knew not that he came.
The Other Man.
Cry 'Murder' in the market-place, and each
Will turn upon his neighbour anxious eyes
Asking; – 'Art thou the man?' We hunted Cain
Some centuries ago across the world.
This bred the fear our own misdeeds maintain
To-day.
His Wedded Wife.
Go, stalk the red deer o'er the heather,
Ride, follow the fox if you can!
But, for pleasure and profit together,
Allow me the hunting of Man —
The chase of the Human, the search for the Soul
To its ruin – the hunting of Man.
Pig.
'Stopped
