







Home Thoughts from Abroad
Oh, to be in England
Now that April ‘s there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England—now!
And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossom’d pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray’s edge—
That ‘s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children’s dower
—Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!
Robert Browning
I have so much fun browsing Google images for pictures of the English countryside. Traveling to England (& Ireland/Scotland) has been a dream of mine for the longest time now — which I hope will happen in my junior year of college. My close friend Bibi (a fellow Anglophile) and I often end our outings together with, “Ahh, I can’t wait to travel abroad with you to England!” The lucky devil, she already crossed the sea a couple years ago for an international student trip to Europe. Until then, I will keep reading my poems about England, drinking tea, looking at pictures and enjoy the fresh hope that springs from dreaming.
