The Wild Common

It is a wild common, flat and broad, The winds are blown upon it, up and down. It is a vast, dry plain, all the open space, A lingering breath of the separate god. No trees to shade it, No moss to keep it warm. Only the browning grass, and dry, They would desecrate your letters here.

But the wild did whirl and rush, And the birds at the dark self-shadows, A slight murmuring, almost a blessing, My earnest desire and my longings condense. The wild common whispers in dreams … the near, the far, thank you and blessing.

Snow in Heaven

The sun is a lump of yellow light Just a little less hot than yesterday, And this huge white continent upon the earth Looks like a soft meringue tat, crusted up with snow. The trees are black.

The stars are acrid, pinched like an old man’s Whimpering bones, suspended in the abyss, But they pierce through the cold, still solid night, And they make a fair song for our dreams. The silence lingers by the long hours, Until an excess of joy wakes softly in the day!

The children dance through the purity of shadows, As they sail their arms from snow to shining.

The Rainbow

When all the world is outward in the light, And all the colors of the world compose, When brighter oranges and violets arise, When yellow is the gold on every rose, All the sky is aflame with a beautiful blue, All the clouds don the softest white of muslin, Speeding like a winged spirit through the void.

But suddenly there is a storm— Grey, and deep, and rising really high, And a flashing lightning strikes down a tree. A bow bends straight, across the sky!

• David Herbert Lawrence