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RICHMOND PARK, by                    
First Line: Oh, have you been to richmond of a windy april morning
Last Line: I shouldn't be astonished if she asked you in to tea!
Subject(s): Nature; Richmond Park, England


OH, have you been to Richmond of a windy April morning,
When the loose white clouds are flying and the blue is washed and clean,
When the beeches on the hill-top don a diffident adorning
And the river twines its silver through the shimmer of the green,
When the cuckoo flings his notes
And the thrushes crack their throats
And the boatmen at the eyot start a-varnishing their boats?

Have you seen its gallant vistas in the splendour of a June day,
Oh, the rhododendron thickets and the water and the wood!
When the stags are still in velvet and across the hush of noon-day
Comes the throbbing of the motors past the Gate of Robin Hood,
When the bracken by the ponds
First unfolds its crinkled fronds
And the dragon-flies are dancing round the slender willow wands?

Have you been to royal Richmond when the year is growing mellow,
And October, mild and fruitful, on its woodland sets her mark,
When the footpath—of her bounty—has a carpet red and yellow,
And the great harts roar a challenge as the twilight meets the dark,
And at half-past five or so
There are lights that flash and glow,
Thrilling upward in the quiet out of Kingston down below?

Oh, have you been to Richmond when the days are short and chilly,
When a red December sunset has been swallowed in the fog,
When the wanderer, belated in the frosty air and stilly,
Sees the tree-trunks full of goblins, and he whistles up his dog,
And turns to look again
At the firelight on the pane,
In the keeper's cottage window, going home by Clarence Lane?

If you've not, then, and would know it, with its pools and forest spaces,
Take this gratis introduction, very willingly bestowed,
And a trifling thing in train-fares will acquaint you with its graces,
Or you'll hear its Pan-pipe music by a 'bus from Brompton Road.
If a Dryad you should see
And you care to mention me,
I shouldn't be astonished if she asked you in to tea!





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