22.05.2007, 21:05
Old Ruralities: A Regret
With joy all relics of the past I hail;
The heath-bell, lingering in our cultured moor,
Or the dull sound of the slip-shouldered flail,
Still busy on the poor man's threshing floor:
I love this unshorn hedgerow, which survives
Its stunted neighbors, in this farming age:
The thatch and houseleek, where old Alice lives
With her old herbal, trusting every page;
I love the spinning wheel, which hums far down
In yon lone valley, though from day to day,
The boom of Science shakes it from the town.
Ah! Sweet old world! thou speedest fast away!
My boyhood's world! but all last looks are dear;
More touching is the deathbed than the bier!
With joy all relics of the past I hail;
The heath-bell, lingering in our cultured moor,
Or the dull sound of the slip-shouldered flail,
Still busy on the poor man's threshing floor:
I love this unshorn hedgerow, which survives
Its stunted neighbors, in this farming age:
The thatch and houseleek, where old Alice lives
With her old herbal, trusting every page;
I love the spinning wheel, which hums far down
In yon lone valley, though from day to day,
The boom of Science shakes it from the town.
Ah! Sweet old world! thou speedest fast away!
My boyhood's world! but all last looks are dear;
More touching is the deathbed than the bier!