Midsummer Eve Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A BCDCE EEFFEEGHIJKKLLMN OOPPQQEERRSSTTUU VVWWXXYZA2B2C2C2EED2 D2E2E2F2G2YZEE H2H2NMF2F2EEEEXXBBE2 E2EEI2I2BBEEEJ2J2RRT T K2K2E2E2OOEEDDC2C2I2 I2L2MMDDM2N2E2E2 O2 P2 Q2R2S2T2U2BP A V2 W2 B B B O2X2O2X2O2X2 Y2O2Y2O2Z2O2 O2 B DO2I2W2O2A3B3C3D3BW2 E3F3G3W2EG3H3 I3BBW2J3B2K3W2DW2O2K W2E2DW2B3BE2X2W2 R2O2L3M3W2 DE2W2N3W2W2BW2BW2O3O 3W2W2Z2Z2ABEW2 Z2Z2L3EZ2 Q2CW2W2P3W2W2Q3O2 Z2R3Z2 Q2O2W2S3T3BOZ2W2O2OU 3O2W2Z2W2Z2O Z2W2W2DOZ2V3OW2Z2W2W 2J3ONZ2 DW2Z2Z2T2B3 W2DOW2 Z2W2 Q2O Z2W2 Q2Z2W2Z2 Z2D Q2W2Z2Z2W2O M DW2 O W2OZ2 O2W2DW2W3Z2Z2O2 W2X3W2DO2 Z2 DW2OQ3L3Z2DZ2DZ2W2DZ 2DOOOY3DL3W2O2 Q2H3 Z2Z2W2 D Q2T2O2I3O2I3O2W2 W2 W2Q3Z3Z3W2Q3W2 OB3 W2OZ2O2A4DDOZ2W2W2Z2 H3T2W2Z2 OW2Z2OF W2 W2 T2B4Z2DDZ2W2OC4DW2W2 D4B4DZ2Z2Z2W2O2OW2W2 W2OO2B4Z2D W2 DDOOO2O2O2O2Q3Q3B3B3 W2DOODZ2OZ2D D B3 W2T2 Q3DW2W2Z2O2 Z2Z2Q3 T2D T2Z2ODE4DO B4O Q2L3Z2Q3OW2T2O O2Z2O2B4Z2T2 T2DZ2Z2Z2W2O T2W2Z2Z2 Z2W2OO2Z2Z2 W2 U2 Q3 O2Z2 T2Z2O2F4T2DW2B4OQ3W2 Z2OM2W2OZ2W2Z2OO2B4Z 2Z2OW2Z2Z2DZ2O2DO2W2 W2O2D T2 O T2W2 Z2DG4OW2O2O2OZ2ODZ2D Z2DZ2O2T2W2W2T2DQ3O Z2OW2Z2W2Z2Z2W2W2Z2Z 2O2O2H4W2Z2Z2 O2T2 T2 U2B4W2 DD U2O2 T2W2T2I4B4DOW2W2Z2W2 J4W2W2W2W2ODZ2W2B4G4 Z2T2OW2K4OW2O2Z2Z2O2 T3OW2OW2Z2 U2OZ2W2B3B4Z2DW2T2W2 W2 O2L4OODW2 T2Z2T2W2 Z2T2 DZ2 T2Z2 U2O2 T2DO2 W2 Z2O2 M4 T2T2DT2E3Z2W2Z2Z2OO W2 T2DW2 OO2 O2DZ2Z2DZ2B4 N4W2OO N4B4Z2 T2W2B4 W2Z2OW2 O Z2DZ2Z2T2OOO4 Z2 T2B3W2W2 W2W2 T2O4 O4 DW2Z2 O2 D DO2DT2DDC4OO2W2W2W2W 2T2W2W2CT2B4AW2O2C4Z 2Z2W2W2Z2Z2T2P4Z2W2B 4T2Q3O2I4Z2AW2CZ2W2Q 3P4T2 T2DW2Z2O2DG4O2B4W2Q3 W2Z2O2W2W2T2Q3Q4W2K4 R4 B4 DZ2W2W2Z2OZ2W2W2DDW2 W2DZ2B4W2W2S4 W2 W2D W2 T2 T2DOO2ODZ2W2Z2O2Z2Z2 O2 Z2OZ2 P4Z2 T2O4W2CW2 Z2O T2 Z2Z2DW2W2I4Z2P4W2B4O 2T2 B4 OQ3W2Z2T2W2 T2Z2Z2OT2 W2OT2T2W2Z2Z2W2T2T2T 2O2W2W2Z2OG4W2T2 T2Z2 D Z2 W2T2 W2 T2Z2D B4 T2 Z2 T2

Midsummer Eve	A
	-
	-
	-
	-
TO CLINTON BALMER	B
AND THE DEAR MEMORY OF	C
JAMES HAMILTON HAY	D
FOR THE SUMMER OF	C
AT CARTMEL	E
	-
	-
In the lost Valley all is still	E
To day upon the stony hill	E
The heat of the late afternoon	F
Settles in coppery haze and soon	F
A voice not known to me will call	E
Silent obedient cows to stall	E
In the same immemorial cry	G
From century to century	H
Changing but by the uttering voice	I
And in a while a little noise	J
Hou Hou far off near Newton Head	K
Will tell that at another stead	K
The browsing cattle pause and turn	L
Unwilling heads to seem to learn	L
That which they know and move in train	M
Now milking time has come again	N
	-
In Well Knowe garden now I know	O
Where the pale larkspur used to grow	O
In the far nook a sound is heard	P
If any is there to hear save bird	P
And field mouse in the strawberries	Q
Stirring like a local breeze	Q
Here there the low leaves soundlessly	E
A glistening slender wasp like fly	E
Is using will and wing to stand	R
Upon the air as though it spanned	R
A chasm with trembling outstretched arms	S
And in the silence of heat stilled farms	S
And heat veiled wood that seems to shake	T
Dim clotted leaves yet does not break	T
By sigh or rustle the hush so dear	U
Its tiny sting of sound sings clear	U
	-
Oft have I heard that elfin horn	V
Sound suddenly as cobweb torn	V
Must sound in startled elfin ears	W
Pricked and on edge with elfin fears	W
And as I upward watched those spare	X
Twin shreds of silver like slit air	X
Beating and shining straight and tense	Y
Simulating impotence	Z
Of motion enviously I thought	A2
Had my half useless flesh been caught	B2
Upborn and for all limit bound	C2
Between such gossamers of sound	C2
Not thus not thus would I deny	E
My spirit's reach and endlessly	E
Use all conception and all force	D2
To limit my short vital course	D2
Had I such wings of urgent light	E2
Insistent not alone on height	E2
But stretched for sweep and latitude	F2
I would not evade flight I would	G2
Employ my heat and power and sense	Y
In realising difference	Z
And see my world's variety	E
Restricted but by energy	E
	-
But Well Knowe garden only shines	H2
In memory now and its dear signs	H2
Only persist and gleam again	N
In a shut chamber of my brain	M
While in a distant place I brood	F2
Upon lost things and in a mood	F2
Of longing and remembrance feel	E
The wisdom of that immobile	E
And senseless mote and think Were I	E
Carnate in a slim glistening fly	E
I would flash back upon that fair	X
Laurel walled rood then drop in air	X
Till no translucent nerve should stir	B
From strained precision nor wing should whir	B
But to maintain one changeless height	E2
Nor move nor waver from that sight	E2
And think the years have not gone by	E
When James and Clinton harboured nigh	E
And working in another art	I2
Than mine yet peopled for my heart	I2
The Valley with the very core	B
Of vital beauty for evermore	B
So that when the air is still	E
I hear below the meadow rill	E
Clinton singing softlier still	E
Entranced by his own moving brush	J2
Among the stream side bracken and rush	J2
Or James repeats with his long hand	R
The distant line of hills that stand	R
Between the Valley and the lake	T
And yet seem lovelier for his sake	T
	-
How many generations past	K2
Should I be dead had I been cast	K2
In that small rapid shape of light	E2
Though wings may stand years move in flight	E2
And while I dream I know I know	O
That it is useless I should go	O
To Well Knowe garden again to see	E
Things that cannot return to me	E
James dead and Clinton gone away	D
And one whose name I cannot say	D
Who built in Cyclopean sound	C2
Other magic heights around	C2
That little place then turned apart	I2
Untrue to friendship and to art	I2
A man of nothing vanished things	L2
Dead friends dead hopes that must remain	M
In a shut chamber of my brain	M
While only Clinton far away	D
Will in these verses and this play	D
See that country of our youth	M2
And our dead friend and our old troth	N2
Of friendship fixed in amber light	E2
A timeless hour that holds no night	E2
	-
Summer Spring	O2
	-
	-
PERSONS	P2
	-
NAN	Q2
BET	R2
URSEL Kitchen and Dairy Girls	S2
MAUDLIN	T2
LIB	U2
ROGER a Carter	B
MEASE a Cowherd	P
	-
	-
	-
	-
MIDSUMMER EVE	A
	-
The scene is the interior of an old barn on a knoll a long time ago At the back the barn's doors are opened widely outside a road rises slightly from left to right in front of the barn beyond this the knoll sinks softly yet swiftly to a great meadow and thence to a wide rich valley of more meadows and ever more meadows with ancient large cherry and crab and sloe and bullace and damson trees in their hedges whence the white and pink thorn blossom clots are not quite gone and of pastures shaded by tall clustering trees Afar the valley ceases in low densely wooded hills	V2
	-
A late June twilight is deepening a faint moist heat haze hides nothing only distinguishing the planes of the distant trees with a cloudy delicacy There is no wind nor any movement one blackbird sings somewhere for a little while then it ceases and there is no sound in the fields	W2
	-
The whole prospect is of a solitary fruitfully overgrown valley shut in from everywhere	B
	-
Within the barn to the left is a high hay mow with a ladder leaning against it much hay has been tumbled at its foot in forking from the carts To the right is a space of floor where the corn is to be heaped in the ending of summer as yet however it is empty save for a wooden plough a homely rough wooden roller wooden harrows an uptilted pleasantly shaped cart whence the hay shelvings have not yet been removed In the far corner of the bare walls of undressed stone at this side is an open door leading into a mistal Presently a cow is heard moaning sickly beyond this door	B
	-
The barn is still more dim than the land so that a stretch of soft brown darkness is all that is known of the far off roof Nearing footfalls are heard in the road and a woman's singing grows clearer	B
	-
HOU Hou went the neatherd moaning	O2
Down along by the pasture's side	X2
He turned the cows at the midden yard loaning	O2
The loitering cows in the brown owl tide	X2
Pale rose the last one munching droning	O2
With wet grass stains on her udder and hide	X2
	-
My lantern's rings to the low balks floated	Y2
As Whitey's tail shook the mistal sneck	O2
When I laid my cheek to her belly spotted	Y2
I felt her honey strong breath i' my neck	O2
For she turns her head does the curd dark throated	Z2
To watch my mouth start her teats with a peck	O2
	-
NAN BET and URSEL ascend the road to the left and enter the barn as NAN ceases singing	O2
	-
They are white hooded clumsily shod gownless in the right hand NAN carries a willow frail the others stoneware greybeards each holds several hay rakes on her left shoulder	B
	-
URSEL	D
September O September's in the song	O2
I will not have September in my heart	I2
The ending of so much deliciousness	W2
The year's sad luscious over ripening	O2
Yet here's the haysel done with how it hurt	A3
To rake behind the last dim cart and now	B3
My soul creeps in me like the low pale night mist	C3
To know that in a moment past this moment	D3
We shall not hear it slowly any more	B
Down in the lane where wisping the close trees	W2
It follows us like a mournful sound of change	E3
Although the Summer is but newly kindled	F3
Tiptoe I over reach the joy of it	G3
Ah little perfect weeks of fruitfulness	W2
Because I tremble lest it be slipping past me	E
Before my eagerness will let me feel it	G3
Must joy for me be ever in things gone	H3
	-
NAN as they set down their burdens to lean	I3
the rakes against the wall where four flails are	B
hung on the left of the door	B
Nay there is comfort in the rainy nights	W2
The long moist twilights of the cider time	J3
When girls hold fitful talk sat in the press spot	B2
Among the hid sweet apple heaps that gleam	K3
In firelight to a humming out of doors	W2
Of soddening water oozing down the soil	D
And there is comfort too at Candlemas	W2
From looking through the casement in the dark	O2
The last thing ere you chafe your toes in bed	K
On the crisp quiet of the woods and fields	W2
Wondering if 'tis snow or all the moonlight	E2
Peering so anxiously along the wall	D
That shades still ewes and whiter first dropped lambs	W2
Ay but I'm tired lasses tired now	B3
Because the haysel's over and 'twas fair	B
And the land's savour wears me with delight	E2
I'm for indoors and resting and beside	X2
I'm fainest of my supper o' baking days	W2
	-
BET	R2
Let all times slip to haste the barley week	O2
For then our nearest dancing time will ripen	L3
But I'm for bed to get me doffed and stripped	M3
To pick much grass seed from my smock and coats	W2
	-
URSEL	D
Listen Bet no cool sheets are yours to night	E2
The milk eyed goodies with grey loose skinned throats	W2
Who maunder of rarer girlhoods none can prove	N3
Tell that at midnight on Midsummer Eves	W2
They waked in some lone shade far from all sleepers	W2
To feel which should be wedded within the year	B
For the year's unknown husbands' images	W2
Come then like swoons from some where ay from some where	B
Thoughts shaping for their women's heedless souls	W2
And if a maid will watch she sees her own	O3
And knows her own seeing her own alone	O3
Peering unseen as breath is in June nights	W2
Surely such dainties rilled no cow slow eyes	W2
But Nan and I mean watching and have bid	Z2
Maudlin at Grassgarth Lib at Appletoft	Z2
Under our breath and hither they steal this eve	A
We knew we must not tell you ere the hour	B
Or or too many hinds might creep to be	E
Their own drowsed leering loutish prophecies	W2
	-
BET	Z2
Am I so old or wistful to be ringed	Z2
That I must feign to be content with one	L3
Where is this moon swayed peeping then to be	E
This blest eavesdropping on a mood of fate	Z2
	-
NAN	Q2
Here in the barn where we may crouch un thought of	C
By moon estranged eyes in gradual darkness	W2
And lest we startle at o'er expected footfalls	W2
Or with night carried voices rouse the farm	P3
Maudlin and Lib will warn us by dove cooings	W2
Sometimes I hear a cooing up warm nights	W2
From dove pairs far too wise to be asleep	Q3
But mistress bides awake for no such music	O2
	-
BET	Z2
Dove cooing Lib will be a thing to brood on	R3
I'll miss nought here although you count me least	Z2
	-
NAN	Q2
All works with us for at the forenoon drinking	O2
I heard dame Stir Wench mutter These kesh pithed lasses	W2
Shall sleep no longer three a bed beneath	S3
The dark damp closeness of the garret thatch	T3
That nigh their heads leans low upon the floor	B
Until this heat is past or they will grow	O
Yet more slob cheeked and sodden and dough limbed	Z2
I never saw maids look more like green sickness	W2
And then she bade Giles carry our gear and bedding	O2
Into the empty meal webbed granary	O
Nought could have fallen better now we have	U3
No moaning ladder's and open doors' groped passing	O2
No stocking feet need pad the dairy flags	W2
Only a silverly weathered latchless board	Z2
Keeps out the bats that flap toward pale shapes	W2
And waits to let us into the large night	Z2
Throughout the holiest of the mothering year	O
	-
BET	Z2
She said green sickness but she meant green apples	W2
The codlin tree that o'er each moonset stretches	W2
A creeping spider shadow on the gable	D
Fills out its fruit weeks earlier this year	O
And the one bough with apples onion roped	Z2
Is one the mended ladder will not reach	V3
It is weight arched against our garret window	O
So that the curled leaves finger on the panes	W2
When midnight winds are sturdy enough to lift it	Z2
Mam Pantry knows and fears bare orchard shelves	W2
And herds us to an outhouse Girls those apples	W2
Will all be basketed before their time	J3
Ere threshing heaps the granary once more	O
And sharp nights make her yield our loft again	N
Because she finds us cuddled on its threshold	Z2
	-
URSEL	D
Mam Patch Waist counts more eggs than four she knows	W2
Spring wenches' whifts let loose to sniff the night	Z2
So straightway to the granary Mease she sped	Z2
To oil the lock and drive a staple in	T2
Small is our chance of watching now	B3
	-
NAN Quick Pattens	W2
Even ere she rounded must have been a likely	D
A very likely maid for her to know	O
Our scapemell moods howe'er we prim our mouths	W2
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BET	Z2
Mease for two kisses left the staple loose	W2
	-
URSEL laughing with NAN	Q2
Ay Bet's the market woman to be sure	O
	-
BET	Z2
Mouths even as eyes were made to earn our wills	W2
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NAN	Q2
But how came Bet near Mease up in the corn spot	Z2
And if she knows the need o' the staple loose	W2
Why will she care to watch with us to night	Z2
	-
BET	Z2
To learn which one it is Nanikin sly	D
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NAN	Q2
Had it been Mease he'd not have chaffered kisses	W2
You know more now than you will learn to night	Z2
You will wed more than all we see to night	Z2
We shall win nought beyond a secret spice	W2
Of unclipt gossip in a tasty hour	O
	-
A loitering dull sound is heard of cart wheels and horse hooves out in the lane	M
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URSEL	D
Hush Nan here come the lads	W2
	-
They lift their burdens and stand aside for the cart to enter the barn but as it comes in sight it passes along the road from the left to the right It is piled with a roped load of hay ROGER and MEASE in long smocks and flapping hats knee breeches and ribbed stockings accompany it ROGER leading the horse MEASE holding to the shelvings behind with one hand and with the other slanting several hay forks and a scythe against his shoulder	O
	-
URSEL continuing What Roger Mease	W2
Why bring you not the cart and top the mow	O
To feel in each limb's ebb hay harvest's spent	Z2
	-
ROGER halting	O2
As we trailed up from Pear tree Dale past Sheep mires	W2
Under a thick dew breath we seemed to steal	D
As 'tween chill bed clothes in December nights	W2
Into the load it soaked two fingers' length	W3
So now we needs must throw it off and spread it	Z2
To wait to morrow's sun out in the yard	Z2
Ere it is ripe to top the sweating stack	O2
	-
MEASE	W2
Moreover we are wetter than the crop	X3
Wherefore be homing russet apple faces	W2
To take our smocks and dry them off while we	D
Drink the mulled cider you are going to make	O2
	-
ROGER and MEASE go forward with the horse and cart up the road to the right	Z2
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URSEL	D
Come maids we'd best get in ere mistress seeks us	W2
Beside the longer we do loiter here	O
The longer shall we hold the house from sleep	Q3
There's bowl and bucket rinsing to be done	L3
And supper to set out if we would eat it	Z2
Be neither meek nor eager in your toil	D
Or Mother Dish Clout in our gust will read	Z2
Some deed afoot we'll wrangle sluggishly	D
Until she drives us off to bed unwashed	Z2
Then though we hear the lock shoot and her steps	W2
Sink down the out stair as she dips the key	D
Down the long pocket of her petticoat	Z2
Do nought but cast your shoes there's but one wall	D
Between her chamber and the granary	O
Lie dim along the bed and never whisper	O
But when we hear her bed stocks creak and know	O
Her ears are well tied up beneath her night cap	Y3
Out slip Bet's staple and ourselves as well	D
Seek the pale hollyhocks across the garden	L3
They glimmer a little in all Summer darkness	W2
And touch behind the hive house shadow hung	O2
	-
NAN	Q2
And in the barn make happiness till dawn	H3
	-
BET	Z2
Dare we lie still inside the dark and wait	Z2
In such suppression for such unknown things	W2
	-
As BET speaks they leave the barn to the right NAN resumes her song faintly and more faintly	D
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NAN	Q2
Dusked seemed the eve as the cows trod in	T2
Under the roof drip each to her stalling	O2
Full udders crusht shagged thighs between	I3
Were warm to my hands in the chill air's palling	O2
And through the wind's drifting of leaves yet green	I3
Hou hou neared the neatherd's calling	O2
The song ceases in the distance	W2
	-
ROGER turns into the barn with MEASE'S bundle of hay forks and lays them in the empty cart as he sings	W2
	-
I get no sleep in lambing nights	W2
My woman gets no sleep	Q3
We fold the ewes if we sniff a thaw	Z3
And when they yean as we crouch i' their straw	Z3
She takes the lambs by our horn fogged lights	W2
While I do handle the sheep	Q3
Footsteps are heard within the neat house	W2
	-
ROGER calling through the neat house door	O
Is the sick beast grown easier by now	B3
	-
MEASE entering from the neat house	W2
Poor Dapple Back milk fever's bad on her	O
'Twas her first calf and though 'twas smoothly dropped	Z2
She could not gather but heaped a shapeless flank	O2
Like a maid swooning when the farrier came	A4
She'll die she'll die he said She'll not said I	D
But nothing served at first her slackened fell	D
Dried hard and never any sweat would stir	O
The udder turned a dull and shivering white	Z2
Yet now her ears twitch up to greet my voice	W2
The hide hair moistens and the udder shrinks	W2
There'll be no need to wake with her to night	Z2
I'll not unwrap her till an hour ere dawn	H3
Come through and look at her as we wend in	T2
When you got up the cider for the meadows	W2
Was there a butt still left	Z2
	-
ROGER as they go into the mistal together	O
Surely there was	W2
But the girls say she'll make it wait till harvest	Z2
I never hired to any stead before	O
Where last year's cider trickled into June	F
	-
All is soundless again save for the cow's moaning The twilight deepens no farther and presently its dead gold brownness becomes cooler in tone the mist which had been merged in the nightfall's dimness imperceptibly becomes apparent again being suffused by an oozing of silveriness through the pervading brownness moon rise is evident although the moon is hidden by the permeating mist which it fills Perhaps a crying of bats is heard but this is not certain An owl cries somewhere probably from one of the gable holes for it sounds both inside and outside at once after many tentative Tu whits it launches a full Tu whoo and swings out far and low across the valley a chirping of frogs begins in the nearest ditches	W2
	-
A closer sound stills all these being evidently that of a woman's voice feigning dove notes it ceases light cautious hurried steps are heard it sounds again Maudlin slips round the door corner to the left and enters the barn She is white capped her gown skirt is bunched about her waist her bodice sleeves are turned back beyond her elbows	W2
	-
MAUDLIN	T2
Nan Ursel Nan Lib Appletoft Lib hast come	B4
There's no one here I wish they might forget	Z2
And sleep and let me feel a little lonely	D
I need much loneliness wherein to suckle	D
The sadness that alone can bring content	Z2
I am too burdened by long laughing days	W2
And as I wavered through this solemn vapour	O
Of the worn earth the comfort smelling earth	C4
Where unexpected trees rose wearily	D
And sank again like ashen bosomed sighs	W2
I felt a new delighting mournfulness	W2
That made me know where I am sensitive	D4
To the deep things of life even the late Maybloom	B4
That stays the tiring Spring in this strange valley	D
Loses its too self conscious hope to night	Z2
The pink would fain be white and the spent white	Z2
Still fog and sink to the moon and make an end	Z2
I must be much alone in sorrowful nights	W2
I should have ease if Summer would but go	O2
Its green lit glory fail I am so eager	O
For overgrown too mellowness loth to pass	W2
For dripping trees o'er soft decaying grass	W2
Bare orchards and shorn meadows and stripped gardens	W2
Brown cloudy woods that drooping mists make taller	O
About washed fields and muffled hills subduing	O2
All to a low remote romance and charm	B4
Yet soon with other maids I may behold	Z2
A change that comes to snirp these buds in me	D
	-
She lays herself on her back among the tumbled hay soon she sings in a low voice	W2
	-
Fetch the porridge pot hither to me	D
The porridge pot and the dairy key	D
And bring me a clout to wind my hair	O
Or the swarming bees will tangle there	O
They drip from the hive in the orchard long	O2
And coil the green cherried boughs among	O2
As they follow the tanking tune I ring	O2
Under the cherry leaves' shivering	O2
They settle they knit come Ailce with the skep	Q3
Step along Mistyhead Smearycap step	Q3
Steady it while I draw the bough	B3
Warily down and shake it Now	B3
After a little silence she resumes	W2
The maids went down to dip in the pool	D
When the mirrored moon had cooled the water	O
But they never told the farmer's daughter	O
For they knew she would tell her mother the fool	D
That the girls were out	Z2
And awaking the water	O
With never a clout	Z2
Though the night was cool	D
	-
She hums the latter melody a little while	D
	-
Without premonition URSEL NAN and BET enter singly and noiselessly from the right each holding a hand of the one before her They are hoodless white capped and barelegged now	B3
	-
URSEL in a low voice	W2
I bade them hide until we came Lib Maudlin	T2
	-
MAUDLIN sitting up	Q3
Lib is not here there's no one nigh at all	D
And in the lanes nought moves but squirrel whifts	W2
Save that long gazing into the green darkness	W2
Seems to show boles half stirred by creeping light	Z2
Amid the darker dark of trees impending	O2
	-
BET	Z2
Was it not Lib who was dew drenched last harvest	Z2
Hid in a wheat stook till she fell asleep	Q3
	-
NAN as they all seat themselves by MAUDLIN	T2
Could any watch you as you slipped away	D
	-
MAUDLIN	T2
Our lambs and three fat beasts must take the road	Z2
Ere dawn to reach the morrow's far off fair	O
So I said I would sleep along the settle	D
And set the hinds their drinking ere they trudge	E4
None smelt me but I must start home by three	D
What is the moaning through that little door	O
	-
URSEL in alarm	B4
I had forgot the beast will Mease sleep with her	O
	-
NAN	Q2
When I came in to milk soon after seven	L3
He said the deathly loosening was pinched	Z2
And we should keep her without more sitting up	Q3
Yet the other cows pushed in and nosed her	O
As cows will do to helpless dying things	W2
To MAUDLIN	T2
A heifer has milk fever	O
	-
MAUDLIN rising eagerly Let me look	O2
I have not touched milk fever once nor seen it	Z2
I want to know what sense it can be like	O2
I am made to know with what sick thought it takes them	B4
To watch it wane and learn to handle it	Z2
Ah let me feel her Nan dear Nannie	T2
	-
NAN Nay	T2
The neat house door is open on her stall	D
And hints the pool out in the yard beyond	Z2
Dreaming a dew dull wash of unborn moonlight	Z2
In darkness sinkingly close as a bat's coat	Z2
And the large stillness of her weary eyes	W2
Might image that although we should not see her	O
	-
MAUDLIN	T2
I know I know But we can shut our eyes	W2
Nay fear would lift them let us enter blindfold	Z2
My fingers know just what they ought to do	Z2
	-
BET	Z2
Nay she might die I saw a cow die once	W2
She tried to turn her head across her shoulder	O
And looked at me as if 'twas all my doing	O2
Then laid it down again with a straight throat	Z2
I fear for that old wrong I never did	Z2
	-
A deep voiced woman is heard making low dove sounds	W2
	-
Comes Lib	U2
	-
They rise to meet the newcomer but draw back half in laughter half in uneasy amazement as she appears to the left She is stockinged and shod but her topmost apparel is nightgown and nightcap	Q3
	-
BET continuing	O2
Lib Lib is she asleep or dead	Z2
	-
LIB entering the barn	T2
Do I not seem the shadow of a husband	Z2
Am I too late I could not choose my coming	O2
'Tis churning day to morrow and nought would serve	F4
The old one but that we must scald the churn	T2
And wipe the cream pots' lips and set them nigh	D
Before we slept she was so cross because	W2
One cow had broken one cast before its time	B4
Some hens had laid away farmer had blamed her	O
For standing over us to make us strip	Q3
The cows too hard so she was queer with us	W2
That kept us late from bed and when at last	Z2
Our fallen skirts were cooling on the floor	O
I had to lay me down beside Ruth	M2
Until she slept for Candle Face tells tales	W2
'Twas she who lost us the low garden chamber	O
Where hang the dry sweet herbs and earned instead	Z2
One with a lattice up against the stars	W2
By peaching of my clambering through the casement	Z2
'Mid dropping plums that night I went somewhere	O
But when I heard her wet mouth on the pillow	O2
I left her stuffed my coats within my arm	B4
And out along the landing As I neared	Z2
The old one's chamber door a warped board chirped	Z2
My limbs went loose and motionless with fear	O
On I slid again and down the stairs	W2
And in the kitchen found I had no raiment	Z2
I dared not grope for it nor make a light	Z2
So two unmended stockings on the settle	D
My shoes upon the hearth were all I had	Z2
But in the warm night it was comforting	O2
To feel myself half indistinguishable	D
From the grey stirless oats I stood among	O2
Or the evasive gleams and thinner places	W2
Of mist lit woodlands or from slim birch boles	W2
And when a woman met me by the brook	O2
I was so pale and slow she ran from me	D
	-
The others laugh as they lead her to crouch with them in the hay	T2
	-
Why is there moaning through that little door	O
	-
NAN	T2
A heifer has milk fever There is a silence	W2
	-
LIB in a low voice Women have that	Z2
Why are we thankful for a deal of trouble	D
My sister Jen was pleased and proud with herself	G4
And when her second obedience came to her	O
She was well eased but goody Slippy Stockings	W2
Who went for wisdom dame bore the hot jug	O2
Too brimmed when it was time to draw the milk	O2
They had to dry the milk and it being eager	O
Went the wrong way and oozed into her head	Z2
The little one died so soon She lay there	O
Sooing the oldest milking croon of all	D
Baby calf lips nuzzle not nigh you	Z2
'Tis my fingers firm that try you Knowingly	D
Patch Eye Teaty I'll not wry you	Z2
Let your warm milk down to me	D
Then she would wear her wedding gown all night	Z2
And in the orchard we could hear her sing	O2
Mall go gather a Posy Lasses turn Grey	T2
Wander Wonder and Peg was clouting her Nightcaps	W2
She sank heavily to uneasy stillness	W2
Then mooed a baby noise till the fourth dawn	T2
She hollowed her arms gently across her body	D
Cold cold she said and then Cover us up	Q3
And she grew colder	O
	-
MAUDLIN Much strangeness comes in it	Z2
I've wondered what there is in me to gather	O
So secretly why life can leak such whiteness	W2
And if we feel it change and how in it	Z2
We sow hid things that never were in us	W2
Can it be that our thoughts go into it	Z2
And all we feel and see must alter it	Z2
From white to white that seems but white to us	W2
I knew a woman and her daughter once	W2
Who went together The young one's died she cried	Z2
O she did cry until the mother said	Z2
Here lass have mine I know and you shall know	O2
Girls she did that quite calmly ere he would take	O2
Mab had to cover his eyes with a warm cloth	H4
And even o' nights to wear her mother's clothes	W2
'Tis grave to suckle across the brood like that	Z2
It threads the mind	Z2
	-
BET Mothering mothering mothering	O2
Cannot we find our lives except that way	T2
	-
The moon seems to be high over the mist now for there is light everywhere outside so that on peering into the night it is with surprise all is found obscure and not easily definable or detachable amid the faint daze of light that feigns to illumine the valley The women have become only black shapes upon the square litten patch which is the doorway surrounded by the blackness of the barn A dog howls somewhere far away	T2
	-
LIB	U2
That dog sounds from some low set roadside farm	B4
What does it hear There is a short silence	W2
	-
MAUDLIN Women what does it see	D
They say dogs howl when someone's fetch goes by	D
	-
LIB	U2
Mayhap it is the husband shapes a coming	O2
	-
NAN	T2
We shall see nought but what is in our thoughts	W2
Yet I'd be very fain to see my man	T2
When Gib at Hornbeam Shallows lost his wife	I4
He had to hire a wench for the first time	B4
And at next Martimas hiring came to me	D
And offered me four pounds for the half year	O
Saying he'd give me his wife's milking coats	W2
To make it up ay and her two best shawls	W2
One darned across the neck place one loom new	Z2
I told him I would liefer have her shoes	W2
That frightened him so well he stammered off	J4
But Sib had heard she drew him with her eyes	W2
And said she'd go for three pounds and the shawls	W2
If he would let her use a gown sometimes	W2
Then at each hiring she stayed on for less	W2
Till in the third year's end he wedded her	O
And so she's gotten shawls and shoes as well	D
I missed a savoury chance for he is old	Z2
And childless both stock and land are his	W2
Ay if I had gone quietly to him	B4
Ere now I might have had him for myself	G4
	-
BET	Z2
I should not wait three years for any man	T2
When Sib would hire a lass Gib said his other	O
Had done without for seven and thirty years	W2
And he had ringed her but to save her wage	K4
At first he sent the hind to milk for her	O
But stopped him soon saying that men's hands	W2
Made cow teats horny then at Whitsun hiring	O2
He let him go grutching it was waste	Z2
With such a goodly woman in the yard	Z2
So now she has to herd and fork and winnow	O2
To drive the cart and take a side of thatch	T3
Gib says young wives are better worth their fodder	O
Than worn ones Truly she has a gown sometimes	W2
For she goes ever in an old woman's wear	O
He says the other's gear will last her days	W2
Nan must surely see more than that to night	Z2
	-
LIB	U2
Ah but Sib knows him he does so fondle her	O
He lets her hair down every eve to spread it	Z2
And feel the pleasure of the comb's sleek goings	W2
Bidding her Stand over as when a cow	B3
Rubs up against the boust at milking time	B4
While when they gleaned their harvest fields by moonlight	Z2
To stint the widows he would bend down as she	D
Bobbed up a mouth all blackberry stains to kiss	W2
Before she is fit for kitchen toil again	T2
He will so wonder how she has grown the mistress	W2
BET laughs	W2
	-
URSEL shivering	O2
Hush do not laugh it creeps up in the roof	L4
And drips on us again like the thick water	O
Through the black pulpy thatch leak in November	O
That laugh sounded as lonely as one flail	D
There is a silence	W2
	-
MAUDLIN	T2
The heifer ceased to moan a moment past	Z2
It seems as if it holds its breath to listen	T2
There is a long silence	W2
	-
BET	Z2
I need to speak but what I have forgotten	T2
	-
URSEL	D
Lass do not make us speak or we may miss it	Z2
	-
MAUDLIN	T2
O do not speak to us or we may miss it	Z2
	-
LIB	U2
We could not hear you for this listening	O2
	-
NAN	T2
I look so deeply that I cannot see	D
I cannot listen for it for listening	O2
	-
There is a long silence which pulses slowly with half caught heavy breaths and slight restless rustlings of the hay in which the women seem motionless	W2
	-
BET	Z2
Do I feel something Do we feel something growing	O2
	-
Quiet steps are heard to shift the lane's pebbles The women look sharply at each other start soundlessly to their feet and lean toward the door they move forward half eagerly yet each seeks to put the others before her so that as they near the door NAN poises unwillingly foremost when the light catches their faces they seem about to laugh	M4
	-
NAN	T2
Nay I'll not meet it perhaps it is not mine	T2
I will not know aforetime to despoil	D
The gradual joy of waking to a man	T2
I will not lose one feeling of dear change	E3
Or slur it by being conscious of the next	Z2
Yet even then love should be marvellous	W2
As the surprise of secret lights expected	Z2
O if I meet some one I do not want	Z2
Come maids join hands and let us go together	O
Still we might make too sure	O
	-
When NAN is across the threshold the others huddle back The steps come nearer In the road beyond NAN a woman appears quietly from the left so far as it is possible to see her features and array are the counterpart of NAN'S	W2
	-
NAN continuing Hey here's a woman	T2
Lib did you tell the slatterns at Cherry Close mill	D
Nay 'tis some rag bag sleeper under hedges	W2
	-
BET in an undertone of wonder	O
Why are their coats alike	O2
	-
NAN turning her head and calling	O2
Ursel Ursel	D
She's from the farm our granary has been searched	Z2
For see she wears my old plum petticoat	Z2
Come let us strip her and pen her in a sty	D
But I have on my old plum petticoat	Z2
And how can she come from the farm when she goes to the farm	B4
	-
LIB hastily and below her breath	N4
Fetches and wraiths fetches and wraiths fetches and wraiths	W2
Peering about her	O
Is there no way from here	O
	-
MAUDLIN under her breath	N4
My mother's grandmam	B4
Saw her own fetch a week before she died	Z2
	-
BET in a low tone	T2
Come through the neat house ere we too see ours	W2
Ursel come come	B4
	-
URSEL in a hushed voice	W2
If all your days are used	Z2
Your fetch can meet you at the neat house door	O
Ah stay for Nan will need us when that goes	W2
	-
BET LIB and MAUDLIN hurry and crowd into the mistal unheedingly Meanwhile the woman has passed from left to right along the road turning always to NAN and holding out her arms to her	O
	-
NAN leaning out toward her with her hands pressed over her heart	Z2
Her unapparent features make me feel	D
How others must feel my face The droop of her skirt	Z2
Is creeping on my hips I have watched my feet	Z2
Draw sideways so Her shadow is long like mine	T2
About the bosom I wish I could touch her hair	O
I know so well the tingle and smell of my hair	O
Is this a fetch	O4
	-
She reaches forward as if she would follow until she is in the middle of the road the woman passes from sight to the right NAN'S body loosens she turns confusedly to the barn and sees URSEL'S face pale in the shade	Z2
	-
NAN continuing O Ursly where have I gone	T2
I have lost myself for I was here but now	B3
She remembers and shakes	W2
Dear soul what did you see	W2
	-
URSEL taking her in her arms	W2
I saw what you saw	W2
	-
NAN	T2
Was it my fetch	O4
	-
URSEL I think it was a fetch	O4
	-
NAN numbly	D
I must be going to die I cannot feel so	W2
There's nought I want to do when I am dead	Z2
	-
She is silent a moment then seems startled into sobbing	O2
	-
O Ursel Ursel I cannot let me die	D
	-
URSEL	D
Folk say a fetch is seen at its departing	O2
From a cold house whence it shall lead a soul	D
But this comes like a child birth closing in	T2
And so perchance it does but signify	D
The consciousness of death that breaks in all	D
We stand outside the process of the earth	C4
And watch it as immortals and consider	O
Death which we think a deeply moving thing	O2
Observing eagerly its fine emotions	W2
The impressive strangeness of its mean romance	W2
Its strong tanged character and accidents	W2
And all the keen new chances it affords	W2
For sympathy and for imagination	T2
But think not to connect it with ourselves	W2
So sure we are all's possible to us	W2
Then a near comprehension that is love	C
Of trees or sheep songs or some man or woman	T2
Shakes us one day and nothing is the same	B4
Because we grow aware that we must leave	A
The very joy that lights ourselves for us	W2
And shows where we may greaten for its sake	O2
'Tis life's beginning we perceive the earth	C4
And go down into it and nestle to it	Z2
Defeatedly before its larger thought	Z2
Numbly we measure ourselves by all we see	W2
We feel uneasily yet willingly	W2
Each thing that happens may happen to us too	Z2
And we are cheated by each grief unsuffered	Z2
Yea ever we interrogate decay	T2
To know our own duration we must touch	P4
Each lovesome thing lest it or we should fade	Z2
Until the searching quiver of contact reaches	W2
And makes us conscious where we can be lovesome	B4
We find ourselves in others and thus learn	T2
How others are in us and so we creep	Q3
To large experiences we could not think	O2
Effectual perfection of ripe life	I4
The earth and all the darling ways of it	Z2
Are ours by love for all that we must leave	A
Comes into us and makes us live it swiftly	W2
Lest we should miss some thing So that one love	C
Insists that every love in earth shall feed it	Z2
To keep it from the unsafety of ignorance	W2
And let our brief days yield their sweetness up	Q3
Such is the consciousness of death ah such	P4
Must be made yours mayhap this is the way	T2
	-
NAN	T2
The consciousness of death Though that be all	D
It is too much even if this fetch abides	W2
Unnumbered years ere I see it depart	Z2
Yet all is made unsure and I may sink	O2
Before I have felt half I need to feel	D
I must make every passion in myself	G4
Have each emotion of my wilful sowing	O2
The pain of sap the pain of bud and bloom	B4
Of hard green fruit sun bruised to thick gold juice	W2
The pain of the sharp kernel in the pulp	Q3
Transmuter of sweet to inmost bitterness	W2
The pain of orderly corruption too	Z2
Of the withdrawing sap of the sick falling	O2
Into long grass beneath the rain soaked boughs	W2
Of gentle decomposing for small roots	W2
So that if death's the end the true completion	T2
I could believe myself fulfilled and ripe	Q3
A sufferer of the topmost joy and grief	Q4
And past the need of any eternity	W2
O I desire old age because old age	K4
Has more capacity more ways of joy	R4
	-
Her sobs hide her words URSEL leads her to the hay and seats her among it again and herself by her putting her arms about her and drawing her head down upon her bosom	B4
	-
URSEL	D
Old age must sit and wait as we must wait	Z2
We can grow old so quickly in our souls	W2
One utters a love call and no answer comes	W2
One suffers motherhood within one's heart	Z2
Of cold unconscious children who can render	O
A tolerance of affection more remote	Z2
Than strait denial and such maternity	W2
Waits not for any bearing through the body	W2
When love has come maternity must follow	D
And if the body may not be made fruitful	D
The spirit chooses its own fruitfulness	W2
All that we miss is happening in others	W2
Others are feeling all we yearn to feel	D
And if we will not let ourselves forget	Z2
How love has wrung us we pass through it with them	B4
Ah wonder joy of contact that enlarges	W2
Our bodies' possibilities and times	W2
And gathers life for us to nourish	S4
	-
A stifled cry from BET is heard from the neat house	W2
	-
BET Aa h	-
	-
NAN sinking back faintly in URSEL'S arms	W2
Does it return and call	D
	-
URSEL Hush 'tis Bet's voice	W2
	-
After a brief interval filled with slight sounds BET appears in the neat house doorway she peeps before her until she sees the two women in the hay	T2
	-
BET in a low eager tone	T2
Ursel Ursel	D
URSEL rises and goes toward her	O
The cow has died in the dark	O2
When I returned but now by the yard door	O
I missed the boust and groped into her stall	D
And did not know until I heaved and spread	Z2
Up a flat softness that went sick beneath me	W2
With long stiff shakings while her unearned wind	Z2
Broke far within then slid against my cheek	O2
I could have borne it if she had been cold	Z2
But she was nearly cold so that I felt	Z2
A thread thin warmth I could not stay nor make	O2
	-
NAN approaching BET swiftly from behind and	Z2
grasping her shoulder	O
Is the cow dead	Z2
	-
BET shrinking from her touch	P4
Nannie the cow is dead	Z2
	-
NAN	T2
I milked her last of all and now my fetch	O4
Has milked her too will it take all from me	W2
I own through love	C
To BET Why did you shrink from me	W2
	-
BET	Z2
I did not shrink from you what need is there	O
	-
NAN holds out her arms to her again she draws away from NAN	T2
	-
Nannie I cannot help it I cannot help it	Z2
There's more than this world in you and I know not	Z2
What you might do to me past your own will	D
You have seen your fetch and are not one of us	W2
For we know not your being's dim half conditions	W2
And maybe if you touch ought that has life	I4
You make it that your fetch can take it too	Z2
So died the heifer Or maybe your least touch	P4
Draws life from others to win you a few hours	W2
Or you are of the dead and call folk to them	B4
Through sympathy of the senses' understanding	O2
Poor Nannie O poor Nannie O poor Nannie	T2
	-
She sobs loudly stooping to wipe her eyes with her petticoat hem	B4
	-
URSEL while seeking to still her	O
Let us turn home to bed we shall not sleep	Q3
But once we're stripped we can relax our bodies	W2
Lying past thought for misery till insight	Z2
Returns again and brings us the proportion	T2
Of all and us	W2
	-
NAN I shall bide here till dawn	T2
To see if I return and go out out	Z2
To BET	Z2
Have you left Lib and Maudlin hiding somewhere	O
Or do they home by now	T2
	-
BET overcoming her tears gradually	W2
We fled from here	O
When when and reached the neat yard ere we knew	T2
We climbed the knoll and passed behind the barn	T2
Then through the corn land dew wet to our hearts	W2
We beat the thick rye down that choked our feet	Z2
Amid its shaggy sighing stilly weight	Z2
Until the cottages at Damson Closes	W2
Hung o'er us like a dark broody winged hen	T2
We shunned the watcher's light where the old woman	T2
Waits for her death and dripped into the lane	T2
Soft as cast shadows Ever all feared to speak	O2
Yet I went with the others through lost fields	W2
Straining to see the thing we prayed to miss	W2
Because I knew I dared not near the homestead	Z2
Until I felt that neither should I dare	O
A more remote returning by myself	G4
When loitering unnoticed by those trances	W2
I sought even you rather than be alone	T2
	-
NAN rigidly her head having been long averted to the barn's doorway	T2
I hear my feet	Z2
	-
URSEL in alarm Nan do not go	D
	-
NAN I must	Z2
	-
BET wildly	W2
Again Wherever shall I go alone	T2
	-
She tugs her cap strings loose and her cap over her eyes she breathes so deeply that her trembling is heard by her breath as she fumbles her way into the mistal The quiet steps are heard again as NAN approaches the threshold the woman reappears to the right and passes down the lane to the left always holding out her arms to NAN whose arms hang tensely at her sides while her fingers twitch at her petticoat as she holds back and back from meeting the embrace URSEL tries to go to NAN but she cannot trail her feet after her nor draw down her hands that cover her face	W2
	-
NAN	T2
How have I parted Where am I in deed	Z2
What of me is unseen Go	D
	-
The woman having disappeared to the left still opening her arms to NAN NAN turns and totters to the door's edge on that side thence she feels her way supportedly along the door but when she comes to its end she slides to her knees after moving a little farther so she sinks forward on her face and crawls blindly toward URSEL'S feet At the fall URSEL'S hands drop she reaches to NAN kneels by her feels her heart and hands holds her own hand before NAN'S mouth and nostrils then with one swift movement she loosens her own raiment nearly to her waist and lying against NAN clasps her in her arms and gathers her into her bosom	B4
	-
URSEL Nan O Nan	T2
	-
The two lie quite still the stirred dust settles on them slowly and greyly in the moonlight	Z2
	-
	-
CURTAIN	T2

Gordon Bottomley

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