Classic Poem

With the acorns yet green on the wide-spreading oak,
While the grass was yet green in his shade,
That had holden it cool from the sun's burning stroke
As it brown'd all the hill and the glade;
There the wind of the fall, in a blast
Flitted fast, o'er the dry-headed bennets.

With folk that, on Sunday, then tripp'd o'er the ground
To the grey-tower'd church on the height,
There the sound of the bells' mellow chiming was drown'd
By the bough-sweeping wind in its flight,
As it made the white thistle-down fly
Low and high, by the brown-headed bennets.

And from hence, on a workday, by gateways and stiles,
And by brook-brim and elm-shaded bank,
We all merrily wended o'er quick-trodden miles
On the pathways, that climb'd or that sank,
To the fair under Hambledon's side,
Sinking wide, with the brown-headed bennets.

There the close-thronging people, the great with the small,
Were all streaming about on the ground,
Like the pool-filling water that, under its fall,
Will keep giddily wallowing round,
Where to-day all the down is left bare
To the air-blast that shakes the brown bennets.

And dear are the paths of their quick-tripping feet
Out by Manston and Sturminster tow'rs,
And the high-shooting maypole in Shillingston street
For the may-dance, with spring-quickened flow'rs;
Or Hammoon, or by Ockford, with wide-reaching ground,
Green, or brown'd with the dry-headed bennets.