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

The past it is a majic word
Too beautiful to last
It looks back like a lovely face
Who can forget the past
Theres music in its childhood
Thats known in every tongue
Like the music of the wildwood
All chorus to the song

The happy dream the joyous play
The life without a sigh
The beauty thoughts can neer pourtray
In those four letters lye
The painters beauty breathing arts
The poets speaking pens
Can neer call back a thousand part
Of what that word contains

& fancy at its sweetest hour
What eer may come to pass
Shall find that majic thrill no more
Time broke it like his glass
The sweetest joy the fairest face
The treasure most preferred
Have left the honours of their place
Locked in that silent word

When we look back on what we were
& feel what we are now
A fading leaf is not so drear
Upon a broken bough
A winter seat without a fire
A cold world without friends
Doth not such chilly glooms impart
As that one word portends

Like withered wreaths in banquet halls
When all the rout is past
Like sunshine that on ruins falls
Our pleasures are at last
The joy is fled the love is cold
& beautys splendour too

Our first believings all are old
& faith itself untrue

When beauty met loves budding spring
In artless witcherys
It were not then an earthly thing
But an angel in disguise
Where are they now of youths esteems
All shadows past away
Flowers blooming but in summer dreams
& thoughts of yesterday

Our childhood soon a trifle gets
Yet like a broken toy
Grown out of date it reccolects
Our memorys into joy
The simple catalogue of things
That reason would despise
Starts in the heart a thousand springs
Of half forgotten joys

When we review that place of prime
That childhoods joys endow
That seemed more green in winter time
Than summer grass does now
Where oft the task of skill was put
For other boys to match
To run along the churchyard wall
Or balls to cuck & catch

How oft we clomb the porch to cut
Our names upon the leads
Though fame nor anything akin
Was never in our heads
Where hands & feet were rudely drawn
& names we could not spell
& thought no artist in the world
Could ever do as well

We twirled our tops that spun so well
They scarce could tumble down
& thought they twirled as well again
When riddled on the crown
& bee-spell marbles bound to win

As by a potent charm
Was often wetted in the mouth
To show the dotted swarm

We pelted at the weathercock
& he who pelted oer
Was reckoned as a mighty man
& even somthing more
We leapt accross “cat gallows sticks”
& mighty proud was he
Who overshot the famous nicks
That reached above his knee

& then each others tasks we did
& great ambition grew
We ran so swift so strong we leaped
We almost thought we flew
We ran across the broken brig
Whose wooden rail was lost
& loud the victors feat was hailed
Who dared the danger most

& hopskotch too a spur to joy
We thought the task divine
To hop & kick the stone right out
& never touch a line
& then we walked on mighty stilts
Scarce seven inches high
Yet on we stalked & thought ourselves
Already at the sky

Our pride to reason would not shrink
In these exalted hours
A jiants was a pigmy link
To statures such as ours
We even fancied we could flye
& fancy then was true
So with the clouds upon the sky
In dreams at night we flew

We shot our arrows from our bows
Like any archers proud
& thought when lost they went so high
To lodge upon a cloud

& these seemed feats that none before
Ourselves could eer attain
& Wellington with all his feats
Felt never half so vain

& oft we urged the barking dog
For mischief was our glee
To chace the cat up weed green walls
& mossy apple tree
When her tail stood like a bottle brush
With fear—we laughed again
Like tyrants we could purchase mirth
& neer alow for pain

& then our playpots sought & won
For uses & for show
That Wedgewoods self with all his skill
Might guess in vain to know
& pallaces of stone & stick
In which we could not creep
Which Nash himself neer made so quick
& never half so cheap

Our fancys made us great & rich
No bounds our wealth could fix
A stool drawn round the room was soon
A splendid coach & six
The majic of our minds was great
& even pebbles they
Soon as we chose to call them gold
Grew guineas in our play

& carriages of oyster shells
Though filled with nought but stones
Grew instant ministers of state
While clay kings filled their thrones
Like Cinderellas fairey queen
Joy would our wants bewitch
If wealth was sought the dust & stones
Turned wealth & made us rich

The mallow seed became a cheese
The henbanes loaves of bread
A burdock leaf our table cloth

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On a table stone was spread
The bindweed flower that climbs the hedge
Made us a drinking glass
& there we spread our merry feast
Upon the summer grass

A henbane root could scarcely grow
A mallow shake its seeds
The insects that might feed thereon
Found famine in the weeds
But like the pomp of princely taste
That humbler life anoys
We thought not of our neighbours wants
While we were wasting joys

We often tried to force the snail
To leave his harvest horn
By singing that the beggarman
Was coming for his corn
We thought we forced the lady cow
To tell the time of day
Twas one oclock & two oclock
& then she flew away

We bawled to beetles as they ran
That their childern were all gone
Their houses down & door key hid
Beneath the golden stone
They seemed to haste as fast again
While we shouted as they past
With mirth half mad to think our tale
Had urged their speed so fast

The stonecrop that on ruins comes
& hangs like golden balls
How oft to reach its shining blooms
We scaled the mossy walls
& weeds—we gathered weeds as well
Of all that bore a flower
& tied our little poseys up
Beneath the eldern bower

Our little gardens there we made
Of blossoms all arow

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& though they had no roots at all
We hoped to see them grow
& in the cart rutt after showers
Of sudden summer rain
We filled our tiney waterpots
& cherished them in vain

We pulled the moss from apple trees
& gathered bits of straws
When weary twirling of our tops
& shooting of our taws
We made birds nests & thought that birds
Would like them ready made
& went full twenty times a day
To see if eggs were laid

The long & swaily willow row
Where we for whips would climb
How sweet their shadows used to grow
In merry harvest time
We pulled boughs down & made a swee
Snug hid from toil & sun
& up we tossed right merrily
Till weary with the fun

On summer eves with wild delight
We bawled the bat to spy
Who in the “I spy” dusky light
Shrieked loud & flickered bye
& up we tossed our shuttlecocks
& tried to hit the moon
& wondered bats should flye so long
& they come down so soon

We sought for nutts in secret nook
We thought none else could find
& listened to the laughing brook
& mocked the singing wind
We gathered acorns ripe & brown
That hung too high to pull
Which friendly winds would shake adown
Till all had pockets full

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Then loading home at days decline
Each sought his corner stool
Then went to bed till morning came
& crept again to school
Yet there by pleasure unforsook
In natures happy moods
The cuts in Fennings Spelling book
Made up for fields & woods

Each noise that breathed around us then
Was majic all & song
Where ever pastime found us then
Joy never led us wrong
The wild bees in the blossom hung
The coy birds startled call
To find its home in danger—there
Was music in them all

& oer the first Bumbarrels nest
We wondered at the spell
That birds who served no prenticeship
Could build their nests so well
& finding linnets moss was green
& finches chusing grey
& every finches nest alike
Our wits was all away

Then blackbirds lining theirs with grass
& thrushes theirs with dung
So for our lives we could not tell
From whence the wisdom sprung
We marvelled much how little birds
Should ever be so wise
& so we guessed some angel came
To teach them from the skys

In winter too we traced the fields
& still felt summer joys
We sought our hips & felt no cold
Cold never came to boys
The sloes appeared as choice as plumbs
When bitten by the frost
& crabs grew honey in the mouth
When apple time was past

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We rolled in sunshine lumps of snow
& called them mighty men
& tired of pelting Bouneparte
We ran to slide agen
& ponds for glibbest ice we sought
With shouting & delight
& tasks of spelling all were left
To get by heart at night

& when it came—& round the fire
We sat—what joy was there
The kitten dancing round the cork
That dangled from a chair
While we our scraps of paper burnt
To watch the flitting sparks
& Collect books were often torn
For parsons & for clerks

Nought seemed too hard for us to do
But the sums upon our slates
Nought seemed too hard for us to win
But the masters chair of state
The “Town of Troy” we tried & made
When our sums we could not try
While we envied een the sparrows wings
From our prison house to flye

When twelve oclock was counted out
The joy & strife began
The shut of books the hearty shout
As out of doors we ran
Sunshine & showers who could withstand
Our food & rapture they
We took our dinners in our hands
To loose no time in play

The morn when first [we] went to school
Who can forget the morn
When the birchwhip lay upon the clock
& our hornbook it was torn
We tore the little pictures out
Less fond of books than play
& only took one letter home
& that the letter “A”

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I love in childhoods little book
To read its lessons through
& oer each pictured page to look
Because they read so true
& there my heart creates anew
Love for each trifling thing
—Who can disdain the meanest weed
That shows its face at spring

The daisey looks up in my face
As long ago it smiled
It knows no change but keeps its place
& takes me for a child
The Chaffinch in the hedge row thorn
Cries “pink pink pink” to hear
My footsteps in the early morn
As though a boy was near

I seek no more the finches nest
Nor stoop for daisey flowers
I grow a stranger to myself
In these delightful hours
Yet when I hear the voice of spring
I can but call to mind
The pleasures which they used to bring
The joys I used to find

The firetail on the orchard wall
Keeps at its startled cry
Of “tweet tut tut” nor sees the morn
Of boyhoods mischief bye
It knows no change of changing time
By sickness never stung
It feeds on hopes eternal prime
Around its brooded young

Ponds where we played at “Duck & Drake”
Where the ash with ivy grew
Where we robbed the Owl of all her eggs
& mocked her as she flew
The broad tree in the spinney hedge
Neath which the gipseys lay
Where we our fine oak apples got
On the twenty ninth of may

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These all remain as then they were
& are not changed a day
& the Ivys crowns as near to green
As mine is to the grey
It shades the pond oer hangs the stile
& the oak is in the glen
But the paths of joy are so worn out
I cant find one agen

The merry wind still sings the song
As if no change had been
The birds build nests the summer long
The trees look full as green
As eer they did in childhoods joy
Though that hath long been bye
When I a happy roving boy
In the fields had used to lye

To tend the restless roving sheep
Or lead the quiet cow
Toils that seemed more than slavery then
How more then freedom now
Could we but feel as then we did
When joy too fond to flye
Would flutter round as soon as bid
& drive all troubles bye

But rainbows on an april cloud
& blossoms pluckt in may
& painted eves that summer brings
Fade not so fast away
Tho grass is green though flowers are gay
& every where they be
What are the leaves on branches hung
Unto the withered tree

Lifes happiest gifts & what are they
Pearls by the morning strung
Which ere the noon are swept away—
Short as a cuckoos song
A nightingales the summer is
Can pleasure make us proud
To think when swallows fly away
They leave her in her shroud

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Youth revels at his rising hour
With more than summer joys
& rapture holds the fairey flower
Which reason soon destroys
O sweet the bliss which fancy feigns
To hide the eyes of truth
& beautious still the charm remains
Of faces loved in youth

& spring returns the blooming year
Just as it used to be
& joys in youthful smiles appear
To mock the change in me
Each sight leaves memory ill at ease
& stirs an aching bosom
To think that seasons sweet as these
With me are out of blossom

The fairest summer sinks in shade
The sweetest blossom dies
& age finds every beauty fade
That youth esteemed a prize
The play breaks up the blossom fades
& childhood dissapears
For higher dooms ambition aims
& care grows into years

But time we often blame him wrong
That rude destroying time
& follow him with sorrows song
When he hath done no crime
Our joys in youth are often sold
In follys thoughtless fray
& many feel their hearts grow old
Before their heads are grey

The past—there lyes in that one word
Joys more than wealth can crown
Nor could a million call them back
Though muses wrote them down
The sweetest joys imagined yet
The beautys that surpast
All life or fancy ever met
Are there among the past