Waiting the Word HALF lost between river and hill,
On a byestream parting grass and plough Is the small Chaucerian mill ; Lonely then, and lonely now ; Where moss and toadstoolget long lives, And undisturbed the brown vole dives,
Where, the dogs chained close to their barrels regard
The rare-coming stranger in the yard As excitement not to be missed, And bark with merry and fierce ado.
The small boy emerges to share it too, And points where the new eels twist And the crayfish feed. The small boy's speech Sounds Chaucer's England, broad and lusty.
The rough walls back to Chaucer reach, Near windowless, mountain-roofed, wry-angled.
Within's the mill-gear, stopped and tangled ; About, the hovels unthatched and musty.
" There's life in it." Wake, 0 fruitful god, So long the friend of sheaf and stack.
Towards this tenement nod.
Along this valley track With whips new-plaited, mares new-shod, Bring pride of golden waggons back.
Your waiting wheels and timbers and stones" Have not forgotten what well they did ; The stream pours fast,—you need but bid, And the work will be done as it was done once.
The miller will thrive And whistle and wive, And the boy whom you see is that miller I swear : He is Chaucer's race, He was born for the place From the way of his tread to the bronze of his hair.
EDMUND BLUNDEN:
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