Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, INTERVAL, by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

INTERVAL, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: When the cloudy evening shows
Last Line: Suddenly unconfined as air.
Alternate Author Name(s): Blunden, Edmund
Subject(s): England; Landscape; English


WHEN the cloudy evening shows
Her white forehead smooth and wise,
Whispering truce to friends and foes,
Content will from his cobbling rise;
Along the cornside then strolls he
And never felt more gay and free.

Lured by that delightful muse
Freedom peacefully prevails;
Boldly then Content pursues
The privilege of downs and dales;
No sooner from his door he gets
Than his unharnessed mood curvets.

In the plum above his thatch
Two young starlings stretch their throats,
The creaking door and clapping latch
Only provoke their shapeless notes;
Two bills upthrust gluck, glup, and wail
"The sons of freedom shall prevail."

Then across the liberal leys
Where brown heads just top the green,
Where the coney-courtship plays,
The tameless wind dares intervene:
And, where Content so lightly strolls,
He spins the parsley parasols,

And bows blooms down, this way and that,
And they as graceful as can be
Protest but askingly thereat
And bid the free caress the free,
Till this republican delight
Makes jealous the usurping night.

Here a word and there a word
The rooks in elmen summits talk,
Some casual wood-side bark is heard,
Or nibbling mouse beside the baulk --
Nightingales begin and pause
As if their music knew no laws.

So winning is the time's white whim,
So indolent and lively too,
Our yeoman finds the dusk and dim
More lighted than the mooning blue;
And on he sings and saunters there,
Suddenly unconfined as air.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net