Bells

WHAT master singer, with what glory amazed. 
Heard one day listening on the lonely air 
The tune of bells ere yet a bell was raised 
To throne it over field and flood ? Who dare 
Deny him demi-god, that so could win 
The music uncreate, that so could wed 
Music and hue — till, when the bells begin. 
Song colours, colour sings? Beauty so bred 
Enspheres each hamlet through the English shires. 
And utters from ten thousand peeping spires 
(Or huge in starlight) to the outmost farms 
Sweet, young, grand, old. The country’s lustiest 
arms 
Leap to the time till the whole sky retells 
That unknown poet’s masterpiece of bells

Edmund Blunden