Quotes from John Clare

Language has not the power to speak what love indites The soul lies buried in the Ink that writes

I long for scenes where man hath never trod A place where woman never smiled or wept There to abide with my Creator, God, And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept, Untroubling and untroubled where I lie The grass below—above the vaulted sky.

I hid my love when young till I Couldn't bear the buzzing of a fly; I hid my life to my despite Till I could not bear to look at light: I dare not gaze upon her face But left her memory in each place; Where'er I saw a wild flower lie I kissed and bade my love good-bye.

Crowded places, I shunned them as noises too rude And fled to the silence of sweet solitude.

Yet simple souls, their faith it knows no stint: Things least to be believed are most preferred. All counterfeits, as from truth's sacred mint, Are readily believed if once put down in print

My illness was love, though I knew not the smart, But the beauty of love was the blood of my heart.

O take me from the busy crowd, I cannot bear the noise! For Nature's voice is never loud; I seek for quiet joys. The book I love is everywhere, And not in idle words; The book I love is known to all, And better lore affords.

Hill tops like hot iron glitter bright in the sun, And the rivers we're eying burn to gold as they run; Burning hot is the ground, liquid gold is the air; Whoever looks round sees Eternity there.

How frail the bloom, how short the stay That terminates us all! Today we flourish green and gay, Like leaves tomorrow fall.

I loved thee, though I told thee not, Right earlily and long, thou wert joy of my ever spot theme of my every song.

There is a charm in Solitude that cheers A feeling that the world knows nothing of A green delight the wounded mind endears After the hustling world is broken off

harm falls most in mans destroying way

In crime and enmity they lie Who sin and tell us love can die, Who say to us in slander's breath That love belongs to sin and death.

I find more pleasure in wandering the fields than in musing among my silent neighbours who are insensible to everything but toiling and talking of it and that to no purpose.

O I never thought that joys would run away from boys, Or that boys would change their minds and forsake such summer joys; But alack I never dreamed that the world had other toys

And what is Life?—An hour-glass on the run, A mist retreating from the morning sun, A busy, bustling, still repeated dream; Its length?—A minute's pause, a moment's thought; And happiness?—A bubble on the stream, That in the act of seizing shrinks to nought.

I wish I was what I have been And what I was could be As when I roved in shadows green And loved my willow tree To gaze upon the starry sky And higher fancies build And make in solitary joy Loves temple in the field

I hate the very noise of troublous man Who did and does me all the harm he can. Free from the world I would a prisoner be And my own shadow all my company.

Crowded places, I shunned them as noises too rude And fled to the silence of sweet solitude. Where the flower in green darkness buds, blossoms, and fades, Unseen of all shepherds and flower-loving maids— The hermit bees find them but once and away. There I'll bury alive and in silence decay.

O lead me onward to the loneliest shade, The darkest place that quiet ever made, Where kingcups grow most beauteous to behold And shut up green and open into gold.

Remember us better than we are.

In mid-wood silence, thus, how sweet to be; Where all the noises, that on peace intrude, Come from the chittering cricket, bird, and bee, Whose songs have charms to sweeten solitude.

A maidenhead, the virgin's trouble Is well-compare-d to a bubble on a navigable river Soon 'tis touched t'is gone forever

When Autumn's shadows idly muse And tinge the trees with many hues Amidst whose scenes I feign to dwell And sing of what I love so well