Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SHEARERS'SONG, FR. KING RENE'S ROMANCE, by GORDON BOTTOMLEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SHEARERS'SONG, FR. KING RENE'S ROMANCE, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: What do the maids at shearing-time?
Last Line: A maid can clip as well as a man.
Subject(s): Sheep; Women's Rights; Feminism


WHAT do the maids at shearing-time?
One doffs her skirts and into the water,
For all the last year's lambs have sought her
Sniffing 'tis she who once brought grain
To fill their mothers' dugs again;
Mazed by her sheep-bell sing-song rime
She draws one into the foam-veined pool
And furrowing through its deep wet wool
Slips her brown fingers small yet full.

What do the maids at shearing-time?
One at the dark, webbed shippon's door
Hears muffled sounds on an earthen floor;
Thence she toils with a haltered ewe
Up to the barn to other two,
Two maids who hum a sheep-bell rime
And part the fleece in the left hand's span
Ere it curls cream-thick from the shear-blades wan --
A maid can clip as well as a man.





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