Bread and Circuses

Chapter 13: TIME’S TYRANNESS

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About This Book

A lyrical collection of short poems ranges from quiet country scenes and childhood memories to urban sketches and religious reflections. The poet renders streams, gardens, market sellers, and domestic interiors in close sensory detail while pairing everyday observation with moral and spiritual meditation. Animal vignettes and playful pieces for children sit alongside elegies, prayers, and ironic portraits of modern life, producing tones of humour, tenderness, and solemnity. Varied forms and concise portraits move between pastoral lanes, London streets, and intimate household moments while attending to time, sorrow, and faith.

TIME’S TYRANNESS

How few alack, There be along the track Of life which hear not at their back

(Though small birds sing And blessèd belfries ring) The creaking of Time’s iron wing;

And, in mad flight From an untempted might, Trample the lovely fields of light,

Nor for a space Pause in their fearful race To look their tyrant in the face.—

In you alone, Dear child, there ever shone Divine deliberation.

And now in weed And grass you bid Time speed Away in dandelion seed,

Till your bright hair, For the down mingled there, His very greyness looks to wear.

Ah happy she Whose gentle hours be Told by such kind chronometry!

For now Time saith, Who smiling listeneth, “Lo, a child flouts me with a breath!”

And so, to assuage Sweetly a feignèd rage, He dims your hair with mimic age.