I. Coaching

(In Scotland)

Where have I been this perfect summer day, --Or fortnight is it, since I rose from bed, Devour’d that kippered fish, the oatmeal bread, And mounted to this box? O bowl away Swift stagers through the dusk, I will not say “Enough,” nor care where I have been or be, Nor know one name of hill, or lake, or lea, Or moor, or glen! Were not the clouds at play Nameless among the hills, and fair as dreams? On such a day we must love things not words, And memory take or leave them as they are. On such a day! What unimagined streams Are in the world, how many haunts of birds, What fields and flowers,--and what an evening Star!