Man and Dog

“ ’Twill take some getting.” “Sir, I think ’twill so.”
The old man stared up at the mistletoe
That hung too high in the poplar’s crest for plunder
Of any climber, though not for kissing under:
Then he went on against the north-east wind⁠—
Straight but lame, leaning on a staff new-skinned,
Carrying a brolly, flag-basket, and old coat⁠—
Towards Alton, ten miles off. And he had not
Done less from Chilgrove where he pulled up docks.
’Twere best, if he had had “a money-box,”
To have waited there till the sheep cleared a field
For what a half-week’s flint-picking would yield.
His mind was running on the work he had done
Since he left Christchurch in the New Forest, one
Spring in the seventies⁠—navvying on dock and line
From Southampton to Newcastle-on-Tyne⁠—
In seventy-four a year of soldiering
With the Berkshires⁠—hoeing and harvesting
In half the shires where corn and couch will grow.
His sons, three sons, were fighting, but the hoe
And reap-hook he liked, or anything to do with trees.
He fell once from a poplar tall as these:
The Flying Man they called him in hospital.
“If I flew now, to another world I’d fall.”
He laughed and whistled to the small brown bitch
With spots of blue that hunted in the ditch.
Her foxy Welsh grandfather must have paired
Beneath him. He kept sheep in Wales and scared
Strangers, I will warrant, with his pearl eye
And trick of shrinking off as he were shy,
Then following close in silence for⁠—for what?
“No rabbit, never fear, she ever got,
Yet always hunts. To-day she nearly had one:
She would and she wouldn’t. ’Twas like that. The bad one!
She’s not much use, but still she’s company,
Though I’m not. She goes everywhere with me.
So Alton I must reach to-night somehow:
I’ll get no shakedown with that bedfellow
From farmers. Many a man sleeps worse to-night
Than I shall.” “In the trenches.” “Yes, that’s right.
But they’ll be out of that⁠—I hope they be⁠—
This weather, marching after the enemy.”
“And so I hope. Good luck.” And there I nodded
“good night. You keep straight on.” Stiffly he plodded;
And at his heels the crisp leaves scurried fast,
And the leaf-coloured robin watched. They passed,
The robin till next day, the man for good,
Together in the twilight of the wood.