Classic Poem

Where the mire was thick from winter sledges,
By the woodside, there I walked and mused
On the deep music floating there out of reach,
Just out of arm's length . . . It was December,
West-country . . . Orange, low, the riband gleamed
Of the sunset, on it tangled twigs in teasing
Show, and the scent of the breath of the earth
Might have borne in me music to stir the silent
Folk of London; disowned, forgot of birth.
I thought that . . . and turning south to my end,
The farmhouse that too brought aid to my making,
Forgot much in tea's desire, by a hearth
To be sitting, talking countrywide, or till limned
Pictures in the fire glow — talking to world's ends . . .
In friendship hiding sorrow, in long thoughts of poetry
As gave us lines and reality of the apple orchard.