John Clare

O how I feel, just as I pluck the flower And stick it to my breast — words can't reveal; But there are souls that in this lovely hour Know all I mean, and feel whate'er I feel.

For everything I felt a love,
the weeds below the birds above.

Remember us better than we are.

This world has suns, but they are overcast; This world has sweets, but they're of ling'ring bloom; Life still expects, and empty falls at last; Warm Hope on tiptoe drops into the tomb.

Hill tops like hot iron glitter bright in the sun,
And the rivers we're eying burn to gold as they run;
Burning hot is the ground, liquid gold is the air;
Whoever looks round sees Eternity there.

And what is Life? — An hour-glass on the run,
A mist retreating from the morning sun,
A busy, bustling, still repeated dream;
Its length? — A minute’s pause, a moment’s thought;
And happiness? — A bubble on the stream,
That in the act of seizing shrinks to nought.

The ivyed oaks dark shadow falls Oft picking up with wondering gaze Some little thing of other days Saved from the wreck of time.

I hid my love when young till I
Couldn't bear the buzzing of a fly;
I hid my life to my despite
Till I could not bear to look at light:
I dare not gaze upon her face
But left her memory in each place;
Where'er I saw a wild flower lie
I kissed and bade my love good-bye.

O I never thought that joys would run away from boys,
Or that boys would change their minds and forsake such summer joys;
But alack I never dreamed that the world had other toys

I am: yet what I am none cares or knows, My friends forsake me like a memory lost: I am the self-consumer of my woes, They rise and vanish in oblivious host, Like shades in love and death's oblivion lost: And yet I am, and live with shadows tost

I loved thee, though I told thee not,
Right earlily and long, thou wert joy of my ever spot
theme of my every song.

Crowded places, I shunned them as noises too rude
And fled to the silence of sweet solitude.
Where the flower in green darkness buds, blossoms, and fades,
Unseen of all shepherds and flower-loving maids — The hermit bees find them but once and away.
There I'll bury alive and in silence decay.

Yet simple souls, their faith it knows no stint:
Things least to be believed are most preferred.
All counterfeits, as from truth's sacred mint,
Are readily believed if once put down in print

I love to see the old heath's withered brake Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze and ling, While the old heron from the lonely lake Starts slow and flaps its melancholy wing

I am — yet what I am none cares or knows;
My friends forsake me like a memory lost:
I am the self-consumer of my woes — They rise and vanish in oblivious host,
Like shadows in love’s frenzied stifled throes
And yet I am, and live — like vapours tossed

Into the nothingness of scorn and noise,
Into the living sea of waking dreams,
Where there is neither sense of life or joys,
But the vast shipwreck of my life’s esteems;
Even the dearest that I loved the best
Are strange — nay, rather, stranger than the rest.