I leant upon a coppice gate
When Frost was spectre-gray,
And Winter's dregs made desolate
The weakening eye of day
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
Had sought their household fires.


"The Darkling Thrush" (1900), lines 1-8, from Poems of the Past and Present (1901)


I leant upon a coppice gate When Frost was spectre-gray, And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day The tangled bine-stems scored the...

I leant upon a coppice gate When Frost was spectre-gray, And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day The tangled bine-stems scored the...

I leant upon a coppice gate When Frost was spectre-gray, And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day The tangled bine-stems scored the...

I leant upon a coppice gate When Frost was spectre-gray, And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day The tangled bine-stems scored the...