Remembrances Comments

John Clare, the son of a farm laborer, called the 'peasant poet' in London, encouraged by the owner of the estate where he lived, lived a life full of sorrow and mental illness. Enclosure, the selling off of the common lands, symbolized to him the death of Eden, particularly his own personal Eden of his youth. This poem is a summing up of his feelings about all this, and may be his best work. It certainly is my favorite, so far. And John Clare is one of my favorite poets anyway. His connection to the land is so complete, natural, unaffected like so many others.