Two autumn poems

[trinkie]

September.
from The Shephard's Calendar
by John Clare.

Harvest awakes the morning still
And toils rude groups the valleys fill
Deserted is each cottage hearth
To all life save the crickets mirth
Each burring wheel their sabbath meets
Nor walks a gossip in the streets
The bench beneath its eldern bough
Lined oer with grass is empty now
Where blackbirds caged from out the sun
Could whistle while their mistress spun.......



How I love the work of John Clare.....
In my opinion the Robert Burns of England.


But now here is a Chinese poem, translated by Arthur Waley

The Valley Wind
by Lu Yon
written in the 4th Century A D.

Living in retirement beyond the world
Silently enjoying isolation
I pull the rope of my door tighter
And bind firmly this cracked jar
My spirit is tuned to the Spring season
At the fall of the year there is autumn in my heart
Thus imitating cosmic changes
My cottage becomes a Universe.

[Kingetter]

Interesting choices Silver Darlings.

Here's one more from Clare -


THE INSTINCT OF HOPE
Is there another world for this frail dust
To warm with life and be itself again?
Something about me daily speaks there must,
And why should instinct nourish hopes in vain?
'Tis nature's prophesy that such will be,
And everything seems struggling to explain
The close sealed volume of its mystery.
Time wandering onward keeps its usual pace
As seeming anxious of eternity,
To meet that calm and find a resting place.
E'en the small violet feels a future power
And waits each year renewing blooms to bring,
And surely man is no inferior flower
To die unworthy of a second spring?

This topic is still with us.

Your other poem reminds me that I've never explored Chinese poetry.