Poems

<h4><SPAN name="A_BALLADE_OF_THE_FIRST_RAIN" id="A_BALLADE_OF_THE_FIRST_RAIN"></SPAN>A BALLADE OF THE FIRST RAIN</h4> <p>The sky is blue with summer and the sun,<br/> The woods are brown as autumn with the tan,<br/> It might as well be Tropics and be done,<br/> I might as well be born a copper Khan;<br/> I fashion me an oriental fan<br/> Made of the wholly unreceipted bills<br/> Brought by the ice-man, sleeping in his van<br/> (A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills).<br/> <br/> I read the Young Philosophers for fun<br/> &mdash;Fresh as our sorrow for the late Queen Anne&mdash;<br/> The Dionysians whom a pint would stun,<br/> The Pantheists who never heard of Pan.<br/> &mdash;But through my hair electric needles ran,<br/> And on my book a gout of water spills,<br/> And on the skirts of heaven the guns began<br/> (A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills).<br/> <br/> O fields of England, cracked and dry and dun,<br/> O soul of England, sick of words, and wan!&mdash;<br/> The clouds grow dark;&mdash;the down-rush has begun.<br/> &mdash;It comes, it comes, as holy darkness can,<br/> Black as with banners, ban and arriere-ban;<br/> A falling laughter all the valley fills,<br/> Deep as God's thunder and the thirst of man:<br/> (A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills).<br/> <br/> ENVOI<br/> <br/> Prince, Prince-Elective on the modern plan<br/> Fulfilling such a lot of People's Wills,<br/> You take the Chiltern Hundreds while you can&mdash;<br/> A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills.<br/></p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />