My Lady Butterfly

Are you a dark moth from a silk cocoon, 
the flower wanderer of the midnight sky 
who drinks from honeydew beneath the moon? 
Not so, you are my Lady Butterfly. 
When we were straying from our proper course, 
swept all awry by wanton blasts of air 
you fluttered on your wings of subtle force 
to find your flower and alighted there. 
Whatever bloom you choose, whatever field, 
your presence makes its beauty twice as much; 
whatever plant with budding petals sealed 
is glad to open to your gentle touch. 
Ah! Lucky me that you have come to sip 
my nectar and to take it from my lip.

The Art of Poetry

‘Of writing well, be sure, the secret lies 
in wisdom, therefore study to be wise'[1] 
but what is wisdom how can it be got? 
It is not learning; cleverness it's not; 
nor ready wit nor probity nor wealth 
nor gained for sure by cunning nor by stealth; 
the words of children oftentimes have strength 
while many grown-up authors rave at length. 
So, writer, may your works be widely read 
but only if you've weighed what you have said.

Mother

The rose that scents the summer day 
and flaunts her colour to the bees 
knows nothing and has naught to say; 
her only talent is to please. 
With fickle blooms and ready claws 
she wanders where the rough wind blows; 
her children left with hips and haws 
abandoned in the wild hedgerows. 
She leaves themn there without a sigh, 
in swollen, orange bulbs they lie 
but like their mother, by and by, 
they grow to flatter every eye.

Mistress Winter's Jump

Over the stile, the sticks and the stumps 
goes Mrs. Winter over the jumps; 
clearing all the ditches, flooded or dry, 
shot from a longbow and feathered to fly. 
Follow the hound that follows the deer; 
jump every fence and swallow your fear, 
up on a horse that is bred from the blood 
with a clatter, scatter, spatter of mud! 
Over the fence at desperate pace! 
Fie to the fox! It's Winter I chase. 
I'll catch her yet if I get a good start 
but she's up, away, away with my heart.

When she's riding, not dancing.