GOLDEN AGE: MONART, CO. WEXFORD THERE was a land of milk and honey. Year by year the rectory garden grew Like a prize bloom my height of summer. Time was still as the lily ponds. I foreknew No chance or change to stop me running Barefoot for ever on the clover's dew. Buttermilk brimmed in the cool earthen Crocks. All day the french-horn phrase of doves Dripped on my ear, a dulcet burden. Gooseberry bushes, raspberry canes, like slaves Presented myriad fruit to my mouth. In a bliss of pure accepting the child moves. Hand-to-mouth life at the top of the morning! Shabby, queer-shaped house -- look how your plain Facts are remembered in gold engraving! I have watched the dead -- my simple-minded kin, Once bound to a cramped enclave -- returning As myths of an Arcadian demesne. Hens, beehives, dogs, an ass, the cobbled Yard live on, brushed with a sunshine glaze. Thanks to my gaunt, eccentric uncle, His talkative sister, and the aunt who was My second mother, from all time's perishable Goods I was given these few to keep always. -- C. Day-Lewis, Anglo-Irish Poet Laureate of England