Mist in the meadows

It’s more like November today. A cold, fine drizzle and yesterday’s blue is now grey and low. I’ll save hedge cutting for another day.

Mist in the meadows

The evening oer the meadow seems to stoop

More distant lessens the diminished spire

Mist in the hollows reaks and curdles up

Like fallen clouds that spread – and things retire

Less seen and less – the shepherd passes near

And little distant most grotesquely shades

As walking without legs – lost to his knees

As through the rawky creeping smoke he wades

Now half way up the arches disappear

And small the bits of sky that glimmer through

Then trees loose all but tops – I meet the fields

And now indistinctness passes bye

The shepherd all his length is seen again

And further on the village meets the eye.

John Clare