Another charming poem from Asylum Poems, the collection of verses written by Clare while he was interned in an asylum. The old poet has an appointment with his love at sunset in a beautiful valley.

Meet Me in the Green Glen

LOVE, meet me in the green glen,
Beside the tall elm tree,
Where the sweet briar smells so sweet agen;
There come with me,
Meet me in the green glen.

Meet me at the sunset
Down in the green glen,
Where we’ve often met
By hawthorn tree and foxes’ den,
Meet me in the green glen.

Meet me in the green glen,
By sweet briar bushes there;
Meet me by your own sen,
Where the wild thyme blossoms fair.
Meet me in the green glen.

Meet me by the sweet briar,
By the mole hill swelling there;
When the West glows like a fire
God’s crimson bed is there.
Meet me in the green glen.

Source: John Clare, Poems chiefly from manuscript, London: Richard Cobden-Sanderson (1920), digitised on Internet Archive. The poem is page 207. See also the hypertext transcription (with a wrong indentation of the verses) in Poems Chiefly from Manuscript by John Clare, Project Gutenberg ebook.

Previously published on Agapeta, 2016/05/29.