The weeders...

[Image: Peter de Wint]

The weeders go to weed the wheat

The weather fine & fair

& find a pleasant dinner seat

To eat their dinner there

The ploughman gets a pleasant boon

& whistles all the way

& leaves his team in after noon

For weeding half the day

The maiden plagued for being fair

Laps thistles in her gown

& gets behind him unawares

To prick the noisey clown

He only turns again & smiles

Nor tries to get away

& runs & stops her at the stile

& so they end the day

John Clare, Poems of the Middle Period

ed. Eric Robinson, David Powell and P.M.S. Dawson