Dreaming of beauty ere I found thee,
And musing by the bushes green;
The wind, enamoured, streaming round thee
Painted the visions I had seen.

I guessed thy face without the knowing
Was beautiful as e’er was seen;
I thought so by the garments flowing
And gait as airy as a queen;
Thy shape, thy size, could not deceive me:
Beauty seemed hid in every limb;
And then thy face, when seen, believe me,
Made every former fancy dim.

Yes, when thy face in beauty brightened
The music of a voice divine,
Upon my heart thy sweetness lightened;
Life, love, that moment, all were thine;
All I imagined musing lonely,
When dreaming ‘neath the greenwood tree,
Seeming to fancy visions only,
Breathed living when I met with thee.

And on that long-remembered morning
When first I lost this heart of mine,
Fame, all I’d hoped for, turned to scorning
And love and hope lived wholly thine;
I told thee, and with rapture flowing
I heard thee more than once declare,
That down the lane with garments flowing
Thou with the spring wouldst wander there.

-John Clare (1793- 1864)

It seems fitting that this poem, which seems to describe L.M. Montgomery’s own Lovers’ Lane, was written by an English poet who was the son of a farmer.  In fact, Clare is said to be “the greatest labouring-class poet that England has ever produced.”

Clare’s biographer said that the poet’s uniqueness lay in his appreciation of the natural world and his fear that it was not being properly preserved.  “No one has ever written more powerfully of nature, of a rural childhood, and of the alienated and unstable self.”

In a way, this description could be used of L.M. Montgomery herself.  Her unending fascination with the beauty around her, which she imparted to her lonely heroine, Anne, seems to have been shared by Clare as well.

Source: Gardens of Love