_19 Binsey Poplars

felled 1879_

MY aspens dear, whose airy cages quelled,
Quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun,
All felled, felled, are all felled;
    Of a fresh and following folded rank
             Not spared, not one
             That dandled a sandalled
         Shadow that swam or sank
On meadow and river and wind-wandering weed-winding
    bank.

O if we but knew what we do
       When we delve or hew—
Hack and rack the growing green!
       Since country is so tender
To touch, her being só slender,
That, like this sleek and seeing ball
But a prick will make no eye at all,
Where we, even where we mean
         To mend her we end her,
       When we hew or delve:
After-comers cannot guess the beauty been.
    Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve
      Strokes of havoc únselve
         The sweet especial scene,
      Rural scene, a rural scene,
      Sweet especial rural scene.