SOTTO VOCE

(To Edward Thomas)

THE haze of noon wanned silver-grey

The soundless mansion of the sun;

The air made visible in his ray,

Like molten glass from furnace run,

Quivered o'er heat-baked turf and stone

And the flower of the gorse burned on—

Burned softly as gold of a child's fair hair

Along each spiky spray, and shed