Meditations on a Holiday

'TIS a May morning,All-adorning,No cloud warningOf rain to-day.Where shall I go to,Go to, go to?—Can I say No toLyonnesse-way?

Well—what reasonNow at this seasonIs there for treasonTo other shrines?Tristram is not there,Isolt forgot there,New eras blot thereSought-for signs!

Stratford-on-Avon—Poesy-paven—I'll find a havenThere, somehow!—Nay—I'm but caught ofDreams long thought of,The Swan knows nought ofHis Avon now!

What shall it be, then,I go to see, then,Under the plea, then,Of votary?I'll go to Lakeland,Lakeland, Lakeland,Certainly LakelandLet it be.

But—why to that place,That place, that place,Such a hard come-at placeNeed I fare?When its bard cheers no more,Loves no more, fears no more,Sees no more, hears no moreAnything there!

Ah, there is Scotland,Burns's Scotland,And Waverley's. To what landBetter can I hie?—

Yet—if no whit nowFeel those of it now—Care not a bit nowFor it—why I?

I'll seek a town street,Aye, a brick-brown street,Quite a tumbledown street,Drawing no eyes.For a Mary dwelt there,And a Percy felt thereHeart of him melt there,A Claire likewise.

Why incline to that city,Such a city, that city,Now a mud-bespat city!—Care the lovers whoNow live and walk there,Sit there and talk there,Buy there, or hawk there,Or wed, or woo?

Laughters in a volleyGreet so fond a follyAs nursing melancholyIn this and that spot,Which, with most endeavour,Those can visit never,But for ever and everWill now know not!

If, on lawns Elysian,With a broadened visionAnd a faint derisionConscious be they,How they might reprove meThat these fancies move me,Think they ill behoove me,Smile, and say:

"What!—our hoar old houses,Where the past dead-drowses,Nor a child nor spouse isOf our name at all?Such abodes to care for,Inquire about and bear for,And suffer wear and tear form—How weak of you and small!"

May 1921.