A.E. Housman
Tell me not here, it needs not saying
what tune the enchantress plays
in aftermaths of soft September
or under blanching Mays
for she and I were long acquainted
and I knew all her ways.
On russet floors, by waters idle
the pine lets fall its cone;
the cuckoo shouts all day at nothing
in leafy dells alone
and travellers joys beguile in autumn
hearts that have lost their own.
On acres of the seeded grasses
the changing burnish heaves;
or marshalled under moons of harvest
stand still all night the sheaves;
and beeches strip in storms for winter
and stain the winds with leaves.
Possess, as I possessed a season
the countries I resign,
where over elmy plains the highway
would mount the hill and shine
and full of shade the pillared forest
would murmur and be mine.
For nature, heartless, witless nature
would neither care or know
what strangers feet may find the meadow
and trespass there and go,
nor ask amid the dews of morning
If they were mine or no.