When I am wearied through and through
and all the things I have to do
are senseless, peevish, little things,
my mind escapes on happier wings
to an old house, that is mine own,
lichen-kissed and overgrown;
with gables here and gables there
and tapered chimneys everywhere,
with millstone hearths for burning logs,
and kettles singing from the dogs,
with faintest taint of willow smoke,
and rough-hewn beams of darkened oak,
with unexpected steps and nooks,
and cases full of leather books –
soft water colours, that I love,
and in the bedrooms up above
large four-post beds and lots of air,
where I may lie without a care
and hear the rustle of the leaves
and starlings fighting in the eaves.
Around the house a garden lies,
a many-coloured paradise,
with sunlit lawns and stately trees
that murmur in the summer breeze,
with beds of flowers, not too tame,
all bright, and never two the same,
and wicker chairs in shady places
to shelter folk with honest faces;
and, if the Lord is very good
and all things happen as they should,
there is a river slipping by
clear as the depthless summer sky,
cool to the touch, and very deep,
quietly smiling in its sleep,
where large, well-educated trout
scull themselves lazily round about:
and here, in a secluded spot,
an ancient punt for when it’s hot,
where I can lie and read a book;
and a canoe to mount the brook
which babbles on with cheerful noise,
chattering low its little joys,
telling how, through Newton’s wood,
it stole, sedate and very good,
but when it tumbled through the mill
it thumped the old wheel with a will;
how the pike of Sandy Ridge
caught the old chub below the bridge;
and so on, if I choose to listen,
until the evening dewdrops glisten.
Thus the river softly glides,
with soft green meadows at the sides
and graceful trees, that form a screen
of greeny brown and browny green.
Down the stream a mile or two
the fenlands come, where trees are few,
a country very deeply blessed
because its sunsets are the best.
There sturdy, sad-eyed fenmen toil,
tilling the heavy, rich-brown soil;
a land where the grey heron breeds,
and wild fowl paddle in the reeds;
a land of molten, golden reds,
of ripening corn, and osier beds.
And up the stream comes rolling ground,
with little hills, smooth-topped and round,
and shady woods and pasture lands;
and far away a mountain stands –
faint silhouette of hazy blue
adding enchantment to the view,
and pleasant sense of mystery
of what the other side may be:
and on these grass lands, in the breeze,
I ride wherever I may please,
and in these woods, where’re I go,
there is no man to say me no.
My companions here are few,
some horses and a dog or two,
cocker spaniels, silver grey,
with tails a wagging all the day:
and all these servants old and tried
are brimming up with quiet pride,
with lots to say, and all content,
each on the other’s business bent.
A lady too, divinely fair,
with dark blue eyes and blue black hair,
who may be gentle and forgiving,
but who must know the joy of living:
shall brightly smile and blithely sing
and laugh with me at everything,
and love the things that I love best,
the woods, the stream, and all the rest.
She, through the languid summer days,
shall roam with me down shaded ways,
and drift with me, as in a dream,
peacefully down the tranquil stream,
and share with me the sweet delights
of moonlit brooks on summer nights,
and through the howling winter days
shall be content to sit and gaze,
embedded in an easy chair,
watching the firewood spark and flare.
And other things I’ll have are these,
large breakfasts and enormous teas,
honey and homemade bread, still hot,
and butter from an earthern pot,
with new laid eggs and clotted cream.
Oh Lord! – to think it’s all a dream!
The following note was scribbled in pencil in Day’s notebook:
I had put a great deal of time in thinking of my perfectly good house, so all the permanent portions of it had got subconsciously shaken into a compact form, and all that I had to do was to read Rupert Brooke’s ‘Grantchester’ once, take a pencil and paper, and write as fast as I could until further orders.