Here in turn succeed and rule <br />Carter, smith, and village fool, <br />Then again the place is known <br />As tavern, shop, and Sunday-school; <br />Now somehow it’s come to me <br />To light the fire and hold the key, <br />Here in Heaven to reign alone. <br /> <br />All the walls are white with lime, <br />Big blue periwinkles climb <br />And kiss the crumbling window-sill; <br />Snug inside I sit and rhyme, <br />Planning, poem, book, or fable, <br />At my darling beech-wood table <br />Fresh with bluebells from the hill. <br /> <br />Through the window I can see <br />Rooks above the cherry-tree, <br />Sparrows in the violet bed, <br />Bramble-bush and bumble-bee, <br />And old red bracken smoulders still <br />Among boulders on the hill, <br />Far too bright to seem quite dead. <br /> <br />But old Death, who can’t forget, <br />Waits his time and watches yet, <br />Waits and watches by the door. <br />Look, he’s got a great new net, <br />And when my fighting starts afresh <br />Stouter cord and smaller mesh <br />Won’t be cheated as before. <br /> <br />Nor can kindliness of Spring, <br />Flowers that smile nor birds that sing, <br />Bumble-bee nor butterfly, <br />Nor grassy hill nor anything <br />Of magic keep me safe to rhyme <br />In this Heaven beyond my time. <br />No! for Death is waiting by.<br /><br />Robert Graves<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-cottage/
