65. A DAY IN SUSSEX
Reading edition
The dove did lend me wings. I fled away From the loud world which long had troubled me. Oh lightly did I flee when hoyden May Threw her wild mantle on the hawthorn-tree. I left the dusty high-road, and my way Was through deep meadows, shut with copses fair. A choir of thrushes poured its roundelay From every hedge and every thicket there. Mild, moon-faced kine looked on, where in the grass All heaped with flowers I lay, from noon till eve.
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And hares unwitting close to me did pass, And still the birds sang, and I could not grieve. Oh what a blessed thing that evening was! Peace, music, twilight, all that could deceive A soul to joy or lull a heart to peace. It glimmers yet across whole years like these.
Wilfrid Blunt.