Yestreen I walked where wind and tree
Called all the lost years back to me,
Where shaken leaf and waft of bird
Spoke to me each its well-known word.
I knew — ah, well I knew of old
The wet earth and the sky's pale gold,
The light wind stirring restlessly
The brown leaf on the beechen tree.
I knew the far grey line of hills
Behind the barn — the daffodils
Beneath the bare bough putting forth
Their spears' brave challenge to the north.
What more? Only the joy, the pain,
Shadows and dreams that waked again
(As in these barren boles the Spring
Wakes at the west wind's summoning):
Only the drift of thorn leaves dry
That stirred and sighed as I went by,
As if some page I turned and read
There an old tale of years long fled.
And the wise wind that keeps alway
The lost sweet soul of yesterday
Brought to me on its whispering breath
Love, hope, remembrance &mdash Life and Death!
Notes
From SMALL CRAFT: Sailor Ballads and Chantys, edited by Cicely Fox Smith, published by George H. Doran Co., New York, US, © 1919, pp. 120-121. First published in SONGS OF SAIL, © 1914.
The third poem in a set called "Songs of Home" published shortly after the poet's return to England after 9 years in British Columbia and as World War 1 was about to begin. They would seem to represent an attempt by the poet to reconcile where she grew up with what she had experienced since she had left England in 1904.
Charley Noble
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