115 Quotes by John Clare

I hid my love in field and townTill een the breeze would knock me down,The bees seemed singing ballads oer,The fly's bass turned a lion's roar;And even silence found a tongue,To haunt me all the summer long;The riddle nature could not proveWas nothing else but secret love.

Old papers thrown away, / Old garments cast aside, / The talk of yesterday, / All things identified; / But times once torn away / No voices can recall: / The eve of New Year's Day / Left the Old Year lost to all.

The time when daiseys bloom divineWith thy calm hours begun / And crowflowers blazing blooms are thine.

Autumn I love thy latter end to view / In cold Novembers days so bleak and bare / When like life's dwindld thread worn nearly thro / Wi lingering pottering pace and head bleach'd bare / Thou like an old man bids the world adieu.

All nature owns with one accord / The great and universal Lord: / The sun proclaims him through the day, / The moon when daylight drops away.

Thy genius saw in quiet mood gilt fashions follies pass thee by.

Envy will gnaw its heart away to see thy genius gather root.

He talks to none but wends his silent way, / And finds a hovel at the close of day, / Or under any hedge his house is made. / He has no calling and he owns no trade.

An old smoaked blanket arches oer his head, / A whisp of straw or stubble makes his bed. / He knows a lawless law that claims no kin / But meet and plunder on and feel no sin —