John Clare: The Midsummer Cushion :: :: University of Virginia Library

Angling has pleasures that are much enjoyed
By tasteful minds of nature never cloyed
In pleasant solitudes where winding floods
Pass level meadows & oerhanging woods
Verged with tall reeds that rustle in the wind
A soothing music in the anglers mind
& rush right complasant that ever bows
Obesceience to the stream that laughs below
He feels delighted into quiet praise
& sweet the pictures that the mind essays
While gentle whispers on the southern wind
Brings health & quiet to the anglers mind
Smooth as the gentle river whirls along
& sweet as memory of some happy song

483

The morn is still & balmy all that moves
The trees are south gales which the angler loves
That stirs the waveing grass in idle whirls
& flush the cheeks & fan the jetty curls
Of milking maidens at their morns employ
Who sing & wake the dewy fields to joy
The sun just rising large & round & dim
Keeps creeping up oer the flat meadows brim
As rising from the ground to run its race
Till up it mounts & shows a ruddy face
Now is the time the angler leaves his dreams
In anxious movements for the silent streams
Frighting the heron from its morning toil
First at the river watching after coil

Now with the rivers brink he winds his way
For a choice place to spend the quiet day
Marking its banks how varied things appear
Now cloathed in trees & bushes & now clear
While steep the bank climbs from the waters edge
Then almost choaked with rushes flags & sedge
Then flat & level to the very brink
Tracked deep by cattle running there to drink
At length he finds a spot half shade half sun
That scarcely curves to show the waters run
Still clear & smooth quick he his line unlaps
While fish leap up & loud the water claps
Which fills his mind with pleasures of supprise
That in the deep hole some old monster lies

484

Right cautious now his strongest line to take
Lest some hugh monster should his tackle break
Then half impatient with a cautious throw
He swings his line into the depths below
The water rat hid in the shivering reeds
That feeds upon the slime & water weeds
Nibbling their grassy leaves with crizzling sound
Plunges below & makes his fancys bound
With expectations joy—down goes the book
In which glad leisure might for pleasure look
& up he grasps the angle in his hand
In readiness the expected prize to land
While tip toe hope gives expectations dream
Sweet as the sunshine sleeping on the stream

None but true anglers feel that gush of joy
That flushes in the patient minds employ
While expectation upon tiptoe sees
The float just wave it cannot be a breeze
For not a waver oer the waters pass
Warm with the joyous day & smooth as glass
Now stronger moved it dances round then stops
Then bobs again & in a moment drops
Beneath the water—he with joys elate
Pulls & his rod bends double with the weight
True was his skill in hopes expecting dream
& up he draws a flat & curving bream
That scarcely landed from the tackle drops
& on the bank half thronged in sedges stops

485

Now sport the waterflyes with tiny wings
A dancing crowd imprinting little rings
& the rich light the suns young splendours throw
Is by the very pebbles caught below
Behind the leaning tree he stoops to lean
& soon the stirring float again is seen
A larger yet from out its ambush shoots
Hid underneath the old trees cranking roots
The float now shakes & quickens his delight
Then bobs a moment & is out of sight
Which scarce secured—down goes the cork again
& still a finer pants upon the plain
& bounds & flounces mid the newmown hay
& luck but ceases with the closing day