The Hawk

Call down the hawk from the air-

Let him be hooded or caged

Till the yellow eye has grown mild.

For larder and spit are bare,

The old cook enraged,

The scullion gone wild.

I will not be clapped in a hood,

Nor a cage, nor alight upon wrist,

Now I have learnt to be proud

Hovering over the wood

In the broken mist

Or tumbling cloud.

What tumbling cloud did you cleave,

Yellow-eyed hawk of the mind,

Last evening, that I, who had sat

Dumbfounded before a knave

Should give to my friend

A pretence of wit?