Behind the Closed Eye

I walk the old frequented ways

       That wind around the tangled braes,

    I live again the sunny days

       Ere I the city knew.

    And scenes of old again are born,

        The woodbine lassoing the thorn,

    And drooping Ruth-like in the corn

        The poppies weep the dew.

    Above me in their hundred schools

      The magpies bend their young to rules,

  And like an apron full of jewels

      The dewy cobweb swings.

  And frisking in the stream below

      The troutlets make the circles flow,

  And the hungry crane doth watch them grow

      As a smoker does his rings.

  Above me smokes the little town,

      With its whitewashed walls and roofs of brown

  And its octagon spire toned smoothly down

      As the holy minds within.

  And wondrous impudently sweet,

      Half of him passion, half conceit,

  The blackbird calls adown the street

      Like the piper of Hamelin.

  I hear him, and I feel the lure

      Drawing me back to the homely moor,

  I'll go and close the mountain's door

      On the city's strife and din.