Westerly end hitched to an elm
sunrise end to a wooden post
my hammock swings in the generous host
of the shade of late afternoon
I lie here in the cooling breeze
and through the slits of lazy eyes
the undulating meadow flows
to the distant maple row
I am dozing but not long
Comes the pad of bare feet among
the ferns by the pebbled path
It is the children from their nap
Heidi and Bronwen tumble in with me
their bare fat bodies still warm from sleep
They wiggle and giggle and say
Let’s go to England Papa today
One shove of the foot against the elm root
and we’re off for old England in a cloth boat
sailing over the children’s sea
so green with lush clover and tall timothy