I am the farmer, stripped of love
And thought and grace by the land’
But what I am saying over the fie
Desolate acres, rough with dew,
Is, Listen, listen, I am a man li

England, what have you done to mak
My fathers used a stranger to my l
An offence to the ear, a shackle o
That would fit new thoughts to an
Answer me now. The workshop where

I look out over the timeless sea
over the head of one, calendar
to time’s passing, who is now open
at the last month, her hair wintry
Am I catalyst of her mettle that,

They see you as they see you,
A poor farmer with no name,
Ploughing cloudward, sowing the wi
With squalls of gulls at the day’s
To me you are Prytherch, the man

The old man comes out on the hill
and looks down to recall earlier d
in the valley. He sees the stream
the church stand, hears the litter
children’s voices. A chill in the

‘Poems from prison! About
what?’
‘Life and God.’ ‘God
in prison? Friend, you trifle
with me. His face, perhaps,

Who said to the trout,
You shall die on Good Friday
To be food for a man
And his pretty lady?
It was I, said God,

Nineteen years now
Under the same roof
Eating our bread,
Using the same air:
Sighing, if one sighs,

We met
under a shower
of bird-notes.
Fifty years passed,
love’s moment

All my life
I was face to face
with her, at meal—times,
by the fire, even
in the ultimate intimacies