Monday's Poetry: "Sonnet on a Wet Summer"

by Pa Rock
Poetry Appreciator

I woke up this morning to yet more rain - and my poor yard is only half-mowed!  Normally by August the mowing would be minimal because most of the grass would have turned brown and given up the effort, but not this year.  In fact, this has been the wettest spring and summer that I can remember.

Today's poem is a sonnet by eighteenth-century English poet John Codrington Bampfylde.  I particularly liked his description of the "dripping poultry," a sight with which I am becoming all too familiar.

Other places need rain - I wish we could share!


Sonnet on a Wet Summer
by John Codrington Bampfylde

All ye who far from town in rural hall, 
Like me, were wont to dwell near pleasant field, 
Enjoying all the sunny day did yield, 
With me the change lament, in irksome thrall, 
By rains incessant held; for now no call 
From early swain invites my hand to wield 
The scythe. In parlour dim I sit concealed, 
And mark the lessening sand from hour-glass fall; 
Or 'neath my window view the wistful train 
Of dripping poultry, whom the vine's broad leaves 
Shelter no more. Mute is the mournful plain; 
Silent the swallow sits beneath the thatch, 
And vacant hind hangs pensive o'er his hatch, 
Counting the frequent drips from reeded eaves.