On Hampstead Heath, Aldous Huxley

ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH

BENEATH the sunlight and blue of all-but Autumn

  The grass sleeps goldenly; woodland and distant hill

Shine through the gauzy air in a dust of golden pollen,

  And even the glittering leaves are almost still.

Scattered on the grass, like a ragman’s bundles carelessly dropped,

  Men sleep outstretched or, sprawling, bask in the sun;

Here glows a woman’s bright dress and here a child is sitting,

  And I lie down and am one of the sleepers, one

Like the rest of this tumbled crowd. Do they all, I wonder,

  Feel anguish grow with the calm day’s slow decline,

Longing, as I, for a shattering wind, a passion

  Of bodily pain to be the soul’s anodyne?

The end