THE WATER-MEADS OF MOTTISFONT
On the painted bridge at Mottisfont above the Test I’ve stood
Where the dab-chick from a rushy raft directs her little brood,
Where fringed with sedge and willow-weed the waters spread about
And linger in pellucid glooms the sleepy spotted trout.
I’ve seen the tawny tumult of the headlong Highland spate,
And the ebb round Hair-brush Island (which the map calls Chiswick Ait)
Where the withy bristles shimmer and the purple mud-banks gleam
And the lights come out by Thornycroft’s and glisten in the stream.