A BALLAD
IN winter, afternoons are short ;
It was a winter afternoon.
The milking was already done ;
I took my man, I took my gun.
That we might have some sport.
We stooped behind the tallest brake ;
There was a bush of golden furze ;
The furze has scent so rich and full
It makes the sense a little dull :
I hardly felt awake.
Oh, could it be the whirr of game,
That sudden, little spring of noise !
Robin was shouting in the wind ;
He must have left me far behind,
So faint his whistle came.
I felt the bushes with my hand :
There was a certain furrowed nook —
The gorse with fire was black and brown.
But there the music drew me down
Into a clear, white land.
There was more grass than I could see,
The grass was marked with pale, green rings ;
And oh, the sudden joy I felt
To see them dancing at full pelt,
The whole Fair Family.
We did not touch the pale, green rings,
I think we eddied through the air ;
A swirl of dew was in my face,
And, looking downward, I could trace
The mark of pale, green rings.
The measure scarcely was begun ;
I could have danced a hundred years I
But Robin, he would surely scoff —
Straightway I broke the measure off :
My eyes blinked in the sun.
If Robin should be come to harm 1
I looked for him to left, to right :
In winter, afternoons are short,
It was too late to think of sport ;
I turned back to the farm.
My mother all the tale should know.
How thick the trees above the hedge !
There was a pond that I must pass ;
I looked in it as in a glass ;
My hair was white as snow.
The servants saw me pass and smiled.
But that was not the worst, for when
I looked in at the parlour door
The children rose up from the floor :
I had no wife or child.
They gathered round me in a flock ;
The mistress jeered. But who was he.
That old man with the bald, bent head ?
Oh, he would know I had been dead,
He would not feel the shock.
His master was away from home,
He said, and rose to give me food ;
"But my old master has been lost
These fifty years." A terror crost
His breast, and he was dumb.
I could not touch the wheaten bread,
So plain I saw the clear, white land.
cursed, cursed elfin-race.
Mid living men I have no place,
And yet I am not dead.
I travel on from town to town.
But always by a dusty road.
By market-streets, by booths and fairs ;
I have great terror of the snares
Upon the furzy down.
But I must see my home once more.
Nor fear to eat the wheaten bread.
Oh, some day I must see my friend.
And eat with him, and make an end,
For Robin is fourscore.
