2i 4 A SEED IN WASTE PLACES 



by the church of Mary-le-Strand all nature 

 was dead. True, there were pigeons, but 

 their wings were tinged with soot, and they 

 were alienated from the wild dove whose 

 nest was among the blackthorns. Even 

 the bark of the plane trees was unrefreshed, 

 and guarded by iron cages ; my thought 

 was shut in too. My mind was never in 

 my drudge work, however much I tried to 

 force myself to think in terms of sensation 

 and factory-made phrases. Everything was 

 ugly, the competition, the smoke, the grimy 

 buildings. 



And then I saw, floating across the 

 shimmering roadway, a few downy seeds. 

 They came from the direction of the Thames. 

 They swung in the motion of the street- 

 air, and the light glistened on their filaments. 

 One drifted to the pavement at my feet, 

 and released a curved brown seed. By its 

 size I knew it to be that of the Yellow 

 Goatsbeard, or John-go-to-bed-at-noon. 

 Immediately the bus-rattle, the whirr of 



