A SOFT and flowered vision
Came on me as a breeze
In summer, and I saw
The souls of men like bees.
Up stairs of orchard foam
With balustrade of may,
Stagger, a mazy cluster,
Drunk with the scented day.
Then strong from newer honey,
With brighter pollen shod,
The little souls went buzzing
Up to the Hives of God.
SHERARD VINES
(NEW COLLEGE)
PERMISSION
NOT till, fallen swooning at the last
Round, heart-broken at the cruel pace,
Thrown out useless from my working place
Sickness, scorn, and bitterness to taste,
Not till hard days have me crucified
To a desk, the close nights to a bed
Comfortless, and all my gain unmade,
All the towers brought low that were my pride,
May I seek the silent golden tor,
Sleep beside long crumbled architraves,
See the desolate glory of the waves
Snarling, like tigers on a lone lee shore.
SUMMER
IN blatant light the grasses look
Like bronzen swords of green,
The hillock-tops simmer and smoke,
The stark road thrusts between.
No mild opacity of cloud
Transmutes the harshness, where
Like stars of newly spattered blood
Kempt cottage flowers stare.
A blast of Hell gets up to flout
The sharp metallic trees,
And hungry insects haste about
Their cruel purposes.