7 JANUARY 1944, Page 10

THE PLOUGHMAN

I AM the ploughman. In the beginning

I scratched the desert with a crooked stick,

Coaxing the half-grudged smile of plenty, And I also rejoiced, seeing Earth's quick Abundance. Next I yoked the ox, The lumbering ox, to heave my wooden share Slowly along the cultivated strip And I went singing after. Then my care Was all to tame the fiery, nimble horse ; His rippling muscles came to do my will, Obediently to draw the keen-edged steel Across the chess-board land, and still

I followed after, whistling, light of heart.

But now I live within a cell of noise, The tractor's prisoner, oil-tainted, shamed To sit in chill inaction, songless And mute, myself the tamer tamed. D. H. Rn_LsoNt.