Runs it not here, the track by Childsworth Farm, Past the high wood, to where the elm-tree crowns The hill behind whose ridge the sunset flames The signal-elm, that looks on Ilsley Downs°? °14 The Vale,° the three lone weirs,° the youthful Thames?--, °15 This winter-eve is warm, Humid the air! leafless, yet soft as spring, The tender purple spray on copse and briers! And that sweet city with her dreaming spires,° °19 She needs not June for beauty's heightening,° °20
Lovely all times she lies, lovely to-night!-- Only, methinks, some loss of habit's power Befalls me wandering through this upland dim,° °23 Once pass'd I blindfold here, at any hour°; °24 Now seldom come I, since I came with him. 25 That single elm-tree bright Against the west--I miss it! is it gone? We prized it dearly; while it stood, we said, Our friend, the Gipsy-Scholar, was not dead; While the tree lived, he in these fields lived on.° °30
Too rare, too rare, grow now my visits here, But once I knew each field, each flower, each stick; And with the country-folk acquaintance made By barn in threshing-time, by new-built rick. Here, too, our shepherd-pipes° we first assay'd. °35 Ah me! this many a year My pipe is lost, my shepherd's holiday! Needs must I lose them, needs with heavy heart Into the world and wave of men depart; But Thyrsis of his own will went away.° °40
It irk'd° him to be here, he could not rest. °41 He loved each simple joy the country yields, He loved his mates; but yet he could not keep,° °43 For that a shadow lour'd on the fields, Here with the shepherds and the silly° sheep. °45 Some life of men unblest He knew, which made him droop, and fill'd his head. He went; his piping took a troubled sound Of storms° that rage outside our happy ground; He could not wait their passing, he is dead.° °50
So, some tempestuous morn in early June, When the year's primal burst of bloom is o'er, Before the roses and the longest day-- When garden-walks and all the grassy floor With blossoms red and white of fallen May° °55 And chestnut-flowers are strewn-- So have I heard the cuckoo's parting cry, From the wet field, through the vext garden-trees, Come with the volleying rain and tossing breeze: _The bloom is gone, and with the bloom go I°!_ °60