The Hawkweed

Between the red-top and the rye, 
   Between the buckwheat and the corn, 
The ploughman sees with sullen eye 
The hawkweed licking at the sky:

   Three level acres all forlorn, 
   Unfertile, sour, outrun, outworn, 
   Free as the day that they were born.

Southward and northward, west and east, 
   The sulphate and the lime are spread; 
Harrowed and sweetened, urged, increased, 
The furrow sprouts for man and beast:

   While of the hawkweed's radiant head 
   No stanchion reeks, no stock is fed.

Triumphant up the taken field
   The tractor and the plough advance; 
Blest be the healthy germ concealed 
In the rich earth, and blest the yield:

   And blest be Beauty, that enchants 
   The frail, the solitary lance.