Brockley Coomb

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Lines composed while climbing the left ascent of Brockley Coomb, May 1795

 

With many a pause and oft reverted eye

I climb the Coomb's ascent: sweet songsters near

Warble in shade their wild-wood melody:

Far off the unvarying Cuckoo soothes my ear.

Up scour the startling stragglers of the flock

That on green plots o'er precipices browse:

From the deep fissures of the naked rock

The Yew-tree bursts! Beneath its dark green boughs

('Mid which the May-thorn blends its blossoms white)

Where broad smooth stones jut out in mossy seats,

I rest:—and now have gained the topmost site.

Ah! what a luxury of landscape meets

My gaze! Proud towers, and Cots more dear to me,

Elm-shadowed Fields, and prospect-bounding Sea.

Deep sighs my lonely heart: I drop the tear:

Enchanting spot! O were my Sara here.

Brockley Combe is a valley in the Mendip Hills in Somerset. There is another poem about Brockley Combe by Arthur Hugh Clough

Poetry Atlas has many poems about Somerset.