Wind and Mist
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HEY met inside the gateway that gives the view,A hollow land as vast as heaven. "It isA pleasant day, sir." "A very pleasant day.""And what a view here. If you like angled fieldsOf grass and grain bounded by oak and thorn,Here is a league. Had we with GermanyTo play upon this board it could not beMore dear than April has made it with a smile.The fields beyond that league close in togetherAnd merge, even as our days into the past,Into one wood that has a shining paneOf water. Then the hills of the horizon--That is how I should make hills had I to showOne who would never see them what hills were like.""Yes. Sixty miles of South Downs at one glance.Sometimes a man feels proud at them, as ifHe had just created them with one mighty thought.""That house, though modern, could not be better plannedFor its position. I never liked a newHouse better. Could you tell me who lives in it?""No one." "Ah--and I was peopling allThose windows on the south with happy eyes,The terrace under them with happy feet;Girls--" "Sir, I know. I know. I have seen that houseThrough mist look lovely as a castle in Spain,And airier. I have thought: 'Twere happy thereTo live.' And I have laughed at thatBecause I lived there then." "Extraordinary.""Yes, with my furniture and familyStill in it, I, knowing every nook of itAnd loving none, and in fact hating it.""Dear me! How could that be? But pardon me.""No offence. Doubtless the house was not to blame,But the eye watching from those windows saw,Many a day, day after day, mist--mistLike chaos surging back--and felt itselfAlone in all the world, marooned alone.We lived in clouds, on a cliff's edge almost(You see), and if clouds went, the visible earthLay too far off beneath and like a cloud.I did not know it was the earth I lovedUntil I tried to live there in the cloudsAnd the earth turned to cloud." "You had a gardenOf flint and clay, too." "True; that was real enough.The flint was the one crop that never failed.The clay first broke my heart, and then my back;And the back heals not. There were other thingsReal, too. In that room at the gable a childWas born while the wind chilled a summer dawn:Never looked grey mind on a greyer oneThan when the child's cry broke above the groans.""I hope they were both spared." "They were. Oh yes.But flint and clay and childbirth were too realFor this cloud-castle. I had forgot the wind.Pray do not let me get on to the wind.You would not understand about the wind.It is my subject, and compared with meThose who have always lived on the firm groundAre quite unreal in this matter of the wind.There were whole days and nights when the wind and IBetween us shared the world, and the wind ruledAnd I obeyed it and forgot the mist.My past and the past of the world were in the wind.Now you may say that though you understandAnd feel for me, and so on, you yourselfWould find it different. You are all like thatIf once you stand here free from wind and mist:I might as well be talking to wind and mist.You would believe the house-agent's young manWho gives no heed to anything I say.Good morning. But one word. I want to admitThat I would try the house once more, if I could;As I should like to try being young again."
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