Poet's Corner

"Home — Thoughts from Abroad"

Robert Browning

Poem explanation

1    Oh, to be in England 



     Now that April's there,



     And whoever wakes in England



     Sees, some morning, unaware,



5    That the lowest boughs and the brush-wood sheaf



     Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,



     While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough



     In England — now!





     And after April, when May follows,



10   And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!



     Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge



     Leans to the field and scatters on the clover



     Blossoms and dewdrops — at the bent spray's edge — 



     That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,



15   Lest you should think he never could recapture



     The first fine careless rapture!



     And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,



     All will be gay when noontide wakes anew



     The buttercups, the little children's dower



20    — Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

Source: Exploring Poetry, Gale.