Nature, Country, and the Open Air
To Meadows
Ye have been fresh and green,
Ye have been fill’d with flowers;
And ye the walks have been
Where maids have spent their hours.
You have beheld how they
With wicker arks did come
To kiss and bear away
The richer cowslips home.
You’ve heard them sweetly sing,
And seen them in a round:
Each virgin like a spring,
With honeysuckles crown’d.
But now we see none here
Whose silv’ry feet did tread
And with dishevelled hair
Adorn’d this smoother mead.
Like unthrifts, having spent
Your stock, and needy grown,
You’re left here to lament
Your poor estates, alone.
Robert Herrick.