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Return To Nature

by William Henry Davies

My song is of that city which

Has men too poor and men too rich;

Where some are sick, too richly fed,

While others take the sparrows' bread:

Where some have beds to warm their bones,

While others sleep on hard, cold stones

That suck away their bodies' heat.

Where men are drunk in every street;

Men full of poison, like those flies

That still attack the horses' eyes.

Where some men freeze for want of cloth,

While others show their jewels' worth

And dress in satin, fur or silk;

Where fine rich ladies wash in milk,

While starving mothers have no food

To make them fit in flesh and blood;

So that their watery breasts can give

Their babies milk and make them live.

Where one man does the work of four,

And dies worn out before his hour;

While some seek work in vain, and grief

Doth make their fretful lives as brief.

Where ragged men are seen to wait

For charity that's small and late;

While others haunt in idle leisure,

Theatre doors to pay for pleasure.

No more I'll walk those crowded places

And take hot dreams from harlots' faces;

I'll know no more those passions' dreams,

While musing near these quiet streams;

That biting state of savage lust

Which, true love absent, burns to dust.

Gold's rattle shall not rob my ears

Of this sweet music of the spheres.

I'll walk abroad with fancy free;

Each leafy, summer's morn I'll see

The trees, all legs or bodies, when

They vary in their shapes like men.

I'll walk abroad and see again

How quiet pools are pricked by rain;

And you shall hear a song as sweet

As when green leaves and raindrops meet.

I'll hear the Nightingale's fine mood,

Rattling with thunder in the wood,

Made bolder by each mighty crash;

Who drives her notes with every flash

Of lightning through the summer's night.

No more I'll walk in that pale light

That shows the homeless man awake,

Ragged and cold; harlot and rake,

That have their hearts in rags, and die

Before that poor wretch they pass by.

Nay, I have found a life so fine

That every moment seems divine;

By shunning all those pleasures full,

That bring repentance cold and dull.

Such misery seen in days gone by,

That, made a coward, now I fly

To green things, like a bird. Alas!

In days gone by I could not pass

Ten men but what the eyes of one

Would burn me for no kindness done;

And wretched women I passed by

Sent after me a moan or sigh.

Ah, wretched days: for in that place

My soul's leaves sought the human face,

And not the Sun's for warmth and light,

And so was never free from blight.

But seek me now, and you will find

Me on some soft green bank reclined;

Watching the stately deer close by,

That in a great deep hollow lie

Shaking their tails with all the ease

That lambs can. First, look for the trees,

Then, if you seek me, find me quick.

Seek me no more where men are thick,

But in green lanes where I can walk

A mile, and still no human folk

Tread on my shadow. Seek me where

The strange oak tree is, that can bear

One white-leaved branch among the green,

Which many a woodman has not seen.

If you would find me, go where cows

And sheep stand under shady boughs;

Where furious squirrels shake a tree

As though they'd like to bury me

Under a leaf shower heavy, and

I laugh at them for spite, and stand.

Seek me no more in human ways,

Who am a coward since those days

My mind was burned by poor men's eyes,

And frozen by poor women's sighs.

Then send your pearls across the sea,

Your feathers, scent and ivory,

You distant lands, but let my bales

Be brought by Cuckoos, Nightingales,

That come in spring from your far shores;

Sweet birds that carry richer stores

Than men can dream of, when they prize

Fine silks and pearls for merchandise;

And dream of ships that take the floods

Sunk to their decks with such vain goods;

Bringing that traitor silk, whose soft

Smooth tongue persuades the poor too oft

From sweet content; and pearls, whose fires

Make ashes of our best desires.

For I have heard the sighs and whines

Of rich men that drink costly wines

And eat the best of fish and fowl;

Men that have plenty, and still growl

Because they cannot like kings live,

"Alas!" they whine, "we cannot save."

Since I have heard those rich ones sigh,

Made poor by their desires so high,

I cherish more a simple mind;

That I am well content to find

My pictures in the open air,

And let my walls and floors go bare;

That I with lovely things can fill

My rooms, whene'er sweet Fancy will.

I make a fallen tree my chair,

And soon forget no cushion's there;

I lie upon the grass or straw,

And no soft down do I sigh for;

For with me all the time I keep

Sweet dreams that, do I wake or sleep,

Shed on me still their kindly beams;

Aye, I am richer with my dreams

Than banks where men dull-eyed and cold

Without a tremble shovel gold.

A happy life is this. I walk

And hear more birds than people talk;

I hear the birds that sing unseen,

On boughs now smothered with leaves green;

I sit and watch the swallows there,

Making a circus in the air;

That speed around straight-going crow,

As sharks around a ship can go;

I hear the skylark out of sight,

Hid perfectly in all this light.

The dappled cows in fields I pass,

Up to their bosoms in deep grass;

Old oak trees, with their bowels gone,

I see with spring's green finery on.

I watch the buzzing bees for hours,

To see them rush at laughing flowers,

And butterflies that lie so still.

I see great houses on the hill,

With shining roofs; and there shines one,

It seems that heaven has dropped the sun.

I see yon cloudlet sail the skies,

Racing with clouds ten times its size.

I walk green pathways, where love waits

To talk in whispers at old gates;

Past stiles, on which I lean, alone,

Carved with the names of lovers gone;

I stand on arches whose dark stones

Can turn the wind's soft sighs to groans.

I hear the Cuckoo when first he

Makes this green world's discovery,

And re-creates it in my mind,

Proving my eyes were growing blind.

I see the rainbow come forth clear

And wave her coloured scarf to cheer

The sun long swallowed by a flood,

So do I live in lane and wood.

Let me look forward to each spring

As eager as the birds that sing;

And feed my eyes on spring's young flowers

Before the bees by many hours,

My heart to leap and sing her praise

Before the birds by many days.

Go white my hair and skin go dry,

But let my heart a dewdrop lie

Inside those leaves when they go wrong,

As fresh as when my life was young.