Alfred Edward Housman

More Poems. 32. Their Seed the Sowers Scatter

Their seed the sowers scatter
        Behind them as they go.
Poor lads, ’tis little matter
        How many sorts they sow,
        For only one will grow.

The charlock on the fallow
        Will take the traveller’s eyes,
And gild the ploughland sallow
        With flowers before it dies,
        But twice ’twill not arise.

The stinging-nettle only
        Will aye be found to stand:
The numberless, the lonely,
        The filler of the land,
        The leaf that hurts the hand.

That thrives, come sun, come showers;
        Blow east, blow west, it springs;
It peoples towns, and towers
        About the courts of Kings,
        And touch it and it stings.