How did the Devil come?
When first attack?
These Norfolk lanes recall lost innocence,
The years fall off and find me walking
Dragging a stick along the wooden
Down this same path, where, forty years ago,
My father strolled behind me, calm and slow.
I used to fill my hands with sorrel
And shower him with them from the tops of stiles,
I used to butt my head into his
To make him hurry down those languorous
Of ash and alder-shaded lanes, till
Our moorings and the masthead would appear.
There after supper lit by lantern
Warm in the cabin I could lie
And hear against the polished sides at
The lap lap lapping of the weedy Bure,
A whispering and watery Norfolk
Telling of all the moonlit reeds around.
How did the Devil come?
When first attack?
The church is just the same, though now I
Fowler of Louth restored it.
Time, bring
The rapturous ignorance of long ago,
The peace, before the dreadful daylight starts,
Of unkept promises and broken hearts.
