They've felled the chimneystack of Magg's old mill
This morning: through the rain, I saw it sway,
Buckle and topple; then I heard the crash—
And just a heap of dusty bricks it lay.

How often, in my dreams, a little lad,
I've scaled the dizzy shaft, that, for so long
No plume of smoke had flourished—from its top
To pour my heart out to the sky in song.

But now the stack is fallen; and my dream,
That sped me heavenward many a blue day,
Lies tumbled, too, among the cinder-heaps,
A dusty heap beneath the rainy grey.