Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE HAPPY SWAN, by FLORENCE CONVERSE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE HAPPY SWAN, by                    
First Line: In the cathedral close at wells
Last Line: Every time you rang a bell!
Subject(s): Birds; Swans; Wellesley College


In the cathedral close at Wells,
In lovely Somerset, there dwells
A happy swan; I saw him float
Up and down the Bishop's moat
Among the cloudy water-weeds.
'Tis an enchanted life he leads.
His grandsire served Lord Lohengrin,
Lir's children are his next of kin,
And Leda's mate and royal others
Fly in his flock, -- the sad young brothers
Bewitched in Andersen's fairy tale,
Tewkesbury's bird, the twain that sail
On Shakespeare's Avon, -- but none else
Except the elfin swan of Wells,
Has a flair for ringing bells.

I saw him like a barge of State
Sweeping toward the water-gate.
I saw the round-eyed unconcern
Of his proud profile at the turn
Beyond the drawbridge, as his glance
Ignored my humble circumstance.
Beneath the gate-house window hung
A rusty bell that once was rung
By travelers who crossed the moat,
Swimming or in a little boat,
To ask a dole; and thither sped
The swan -- I saw him rear his head
And stretch his neck and seize the string
And ring the little bell, and ring
And ring, until his shrill demand
Was answered by a fluttering hand
Romantically strewing cake
Upon thee waters, for his sake.
It was the hour when mortals take
Their tea in England; all the bells
Were ringing four o'clock in Wells.

And all the while the bells were ringing,
I heard the Welsh coal-miners singing
Without the green close, in the glare
Of the dusty market-square:
I heard the strikers out of Wales,
The sooty Cambrian nightingales,
Singing their hunger-songs; I heard
The music sweet, the bitter word.
Through the Porch called Penniless
Grievance chaunted, and Distress
Hymned old haunting melodies.
But swans and canons took their teas.

O strange to be a happy swan,
Privileged to float upon
Waters ecclesiastical
In faerie peace fantastical;
A her o in a charmed life
Untouched by our industrial strife,
Unshadowed by the awful dread
Of hungering for daily bread.
O strange to know that manna fell
Every time you rang a bell!





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