Heath doggerel

These words happened to me, quite suddenly, on Salthouse Heath and thereabouts this morning. I am a little sheepish about them but, as Lear and most of Hardy's heroines well know, worse things happen on heaths.


I am this just back whitethroat song,
The vanished weak the singing strong,
Winging two continents along,
I am the heartless spring.

I am the not yet nightingale,
The blossom blackthorn fading frail,
A great tit chime a curlew wail,
I am I am the spring.

I am the muntjac mudprint hoof,
I am the spring sky cyan roof,
I am the low cloud cold reproof,
I am the spring I am.

I am the little bit of bread,
The yellowhammer's yellow head,
The yellow gorse the pheasant red,
The growing living and the dead,
I am the spring.

I am the lapwing tumble now,
The muddy hoof contented cow,
The orange greylag beady brow,
Life I death I am spring.

I am the snapped twig heart of spring,
In words in birds in chiffchaff ring,
I am the chaffinch clattering,
The spring the spring I am the spring.

I am all nature savagery,
The lark aloft cacophony,
This brittle reedstem symphony,
I am this brittle spring.