Invisible Kingdom

DOWN the long London street the light cut keen
As a knife blade, hard and white: the winter day
Walked shoulder to shoulder with me — but between
Myself and the London noon, the scent of hay
Struck suddenly, as I passed an open stable door,
And the woman, the time, and the hour were there no more.

I was a child, and I felt beneath my knees
The rough boards of the hay cart, saw the painted side
Swaying against the dull sky and the heavy trees;
Thunder purpled the air — and when they cried
‘Look out there!’ and a truss of hay was flung
Billowing over the side of the cart,
It seemed, a moment, that the heavens hung
Suspended in great waves — that fell apart,
Fell round my knees in strands of grass and clover,
And a lark sang, because fear of the deluge was over.

The light cut keen as a knife between eyes and brain,
And the woman, the time, and the hour were back again.

Until I smelt the hay, I did not know
That I was carrying about with me
A hayfield and a cart — and it must be
That everywhere I go
There goes an unseen realm, unconquered still
By the assault of will,
But yielding up its green and sacred ground
To the random touch of scent and sound.
Time and space can scarce contain
The crowds that throng the unsuspecting brain,
Where every soul assumes a hundred guises,
And the child lives immortal though the man is born,
Where, when the sudden challenge of a questing horn,
Or a bell ringing through the dusk, surprises
The sentries of the unseen realm, its skies appear
All languorous beneath the hand of June, or clear
At the golden fall of the year —
Where winter night goes hand in hand with summer morn.
How can the brain enfold
Fields that five counties are too small to hold ?

Down the long London street in the wintry sun
The people walk with less security
Than tight-rope walkers — for each one,
Holding his course in space and time,
Is poised above a gulf, where he
May sink at the sweet bidding of a chime,
Of a tune tinkled on a music box,
Or a bird singing, or may fall
Encountering suddenly the scent of stocks
That weights the air on summer eves,
Wood smoke, or rain-drenched leaves,
Or peaches ripe against the wall.

Of these invisible realms, who can descry
The boundaries, or who can say
Which of the passers-by
Walks down the London street, and which is far away
Under another sky
Whose beams eclipse the winter day?
Kingdom is heaped on kingdom, and the wonder is
How London streets can hold such realms and dynasties.