 | John Clare: The Midsummer Cushion |  |
PARTRIDGE COVEYS
Among the stubbles when the fields grow grey& mellow harvest gathers to a close
The painful gleaner twenty times a day
Start up the partridge broods that glad repose
Upon the grassy slip or sunny land
Yet ever it would seem in dangers way
Where snufting dogs their rustling haunts betray
& tracking gunners ever seem at hand
Oft frighted up they startle to the shade
Of neighbouring wood & through the yellow leaves
Drop wearied where the brakes & ferns hath made
A solitary covert—that decieves
For there the fox prowls its unnoticed round
& danger dares them upon every ground
| John Clare: The Midsummer Cushion | |