We present this work in honor of the poet’s 135th birthday.

 

Over the wheatfields the sky was shot with light
And there was one large star.
The Pentland Hills were full of purple night.
I heard afar
The rush of a motor car,
And as I passed by the hedge the corn leaned out
Wind-impelled, and touched my hand about,
Then withdrew.

I knew
The star as my own
And the fields full-grown;
I looked at the wheat and said
‘At Liège the gold is red,
And to-night how still the dead must lie
With their faces stark to the open sky
Or dreadfully earthward turned.’
Over the corn the wind mourned.
I looked at the star and cried,
‘Of Heaven the doors are very wide,
And God has hung a little light
For stragglers who fall in to-night.’