But once I went through the lanes, over the sharp Tilt of the little bridges; past the forge, And heard the clang of anvil and iron, And saw the founting sparks in the dusky forge, And men outside with horses, gossiping. So I came through that April England, moist And green in its lush fields between the willows, Foaming with cherry in the woods, and pale With clouds of lady's-smock along the hedge, Until I came to a gate and left the road For the gentle fields that enticed me, by the farms, Wandering through the embroidered fields, each one So like its fellow; wandered through the gaps, Past the mild cattle knee-deep in the brooks, And wandered drowsing as the meadows drowsed Under the pale wide heaven and slow clouds. And then I came to a field where the springing grass Was dulled by the hanging cups of fritillaries, Sullen and foreign-looking, the snaky flower, Scarfed in dull purple, like Egyptian girls Camping among the furze, staining the waste With foreign colour, sulky—dark and quaint, Dangerous too, as a girl might sidle up, An Egyptian girl, with an ancient snaring spell, Throwing a net, soft round the limbs and heart, Captivity soft and abhorrent, a close-meshed net, —See the square web on the murrey flesh of the flower— Holding her captive close with her bare brown arms. Close to her little breast beneath the silk, A gipsy Judith, witch of a ragged tent, And I sank from the English field of fritillaries Before it should be too late, before I forgot The cherry white in the woods, and the curdled clouds, And the lapwings crying free above the plough. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ON THE 'VITA NUOVA' OF DANTE by DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI A SATIRE [OR, SATYR] AGAINST MANKIND by JOHN WILMOT NO SONGS IN WINTER by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH BEAUTY OF NATURE by HENRY ALFORD FALSORUM DEORUM CULTOR by WILLIAM ROSE BENET CAN YOU HEAR IT? by THERESA DRULEY BLACK |