Sonnets, Lyrics and Translations | ||
35
OLD RURALITIES.
A REGRET.
With joy all relics of the past I hail;The heath-bell, lingering in our cultur'd moor,
Or the dull sound of the slip-shoulder'd flail,
Still busy on the poor man's threshing-floor:
I love this unshorn hedgerow, which survives
Its stunted neighbours, in this farming age:
The thatch and house-leek, 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 death-bed than the bier!
Sonnets, Lyrics and Translations | ||