The seer can warm his body through
By some far fire he sees;
The fool can naked dance in snow;
The singer—as he please!
And which I be of these, oho,
That is a guess for you!
Once in a thousand years, they say,
The walls are beaten down;
And then they find a singer dead;
But swift they set a crown
Upon his lowly, careless head,
And sing his song for aye!
So I to Luthany will flee,
While here the winter raves.
God send I go not as one blind
A-dancing upon graves!
God save a madman if I find
War's heel on Luthany!
THERE'S mist in the hollows,
There's gold on the tree,
And South go the swallows
Away over sea.
They home in our steeple
That climbs in the wind,
And, parson and people,
We welcome them kind.
The steeple was set here
In 1266;
If William could get here
He'd burn it to sticks.