MEMORIES

Come, Iago, my friend, and let us stand together
Now in the time of the mild weather,
Before the wind changes and the winter brings
The leprous frost to the fields, and I will sing
The land�fs praises, making articulate
Your strong feelings, your thoughts of no date,
Your secret learning, innocent of books.
Do you remember the shoals of wheat, the look
Of the prawned barley, and the hissing swarm
Of winged oats busy about the warm
Stalks? Or the music of the taut scythe
Breaking in regular waves upon the lithe
Limbs of the grass? Do you recall the days
Of the young spring with lambs mocking the snow
That was patched with green and gold in the bare fields?
Or the autumn nights with Sirius loud as a bird
In the wood�fs darkness?
                                    Yes, though your lips are sealed
By a natural reticence, your eyes betray
The heart�fs rich harvest, gathered seasons ago
When I was a child too small even to have heard
Under the sombre foliage of the sky
The owl and badger answering my cry.