This is a heart rending, beautiful poem. Thank you for sharing. I have learned so much and found so much to love and explore of 18th century literature.
Where I live in the English midlands there is an old farm with wheat fields and I walk through a lane cutting across it on my walks sometimes. There is a single oak tree bang in the middle of the wheat field sitting alone. I learned that oak trees were planted in fields hundreds of years ago so the people tilling the fields and reaping the wheat would have shelter from the blazing sun and the pouring rain. Where boys and men sat as they worked for their humble dole. Now its scenic and beautifully aesthetic, the sole oak tree in yellow gold field. But it was born of human toil and shelter.
This is a heart rending, beautiful poem. Thank you for sharing. I have learned so much and found so much to love and explore of 18th century literature.
a great age for poetry!
Indeed!
Where I live in the English midlands there is an old farm with wheat fields and I walk through a lane cutting across it on my walks sometimes. There is a single oak tree bang in the middle of the wheat field sitting alone. I learned that oak trees were planted in fields hundreds of years ago so the people tilling the fields and reaping the wheat would have shelter from the blazing sun and the pouring rain. Where boys and men sat as they worked for their humble dole. Now its scenic and beautifully aesthetic, the sole oak tree in yellow gold field. But it was born of human toil and shelter.
and still a good place to get some shade
When reeds are dead and a straw to thatch the marshes,
And feathered pampas-grass rides into the wind
Like aged warriors westward, tragic, thinned
Of half their tribe, and over the flattened rushes,
Stripped of its secret, open, stark and bleak,
Blackens afar the half-forgotten creek,—
Then leans on me the weight of the year, and crushes
My heart. I know that Beauty must ail and die,
And will be born again,—but ah, to see
Beauty stiffened, staring up at the sky!
Oh, Autumn! Autumn!—What is the Spring to me?
Edna St. Vincent Millay 1922.
I love the turns in her sonnets...
Fall is always my favorite. (until the Spring)
So sensual and gorgeous, this poem. Also the painting. Thank you so much, Henry.
isnt it lovely
Nice little human touches in it. Thanks!
I can recommend Haydn’s oratorio ‘The Seasons’ the libretto of which is based on Thompson’s poem (which is very beautiful).
Make that THOMSON’S poem!
ah will listen thank you
Crowned with the sickle and the wheaten sheaf
While Autumn nodding o’er the yellow plain
Comes jovial on, the Doric reed once more
Well-pleased I tune. I’m curious about the Doric reed Henry?
I'd guess this would be panpipes or similar...
It is a shepherd's pipe, from pastoral, and it become a symbol of his own poem, a fairly standard image.
Excellent clarity. Many thanks Henry.
https://open.spotify.com/album/0V9ceCmI4MfmBgce7SOiso?si=He7pEW9DRcGgdVB1XgVfew
This is a link to Haydn's 'The Seasons'. Classic performance conducted by Colin Davis - sung in English.
Lest we forget we need a thriving farming community providing food grown locally and sustainably, thank you 🙏
Brings to mind the book of Ruth. Generosity given from blessed abundance.