Mistress Masham's

Last night I dreamt I went to that old place again.
It's rooms are vast and never ending and outside
The fields of rolling, golden crops are rippling. When
I stand beside a sagging sash in some high attic looking out,

I know the not so deep, mysterious thing, implied
By all these empty rooms and dust. Yet brooking
Every argument my brain in sleep can make and then
Inspired to further avarice I lust by day and search the country wide,
For run down manor houses in their sad decay.
Because I really do not want to know, the truth my mind
Seeks sideways on to show, I only wish to look and find
And then to go, to this recurring paradise. I'll ride
Through endless, shabby eighteenth century rooms
On rollerskates, waking each one from its long repose
And see the tangled gardens down below,
And feel the hot wind of high summer blow
And smell the ripening wheat and climbing rose,
As through the grey-green corridors I glide.