Vocabulary in Letters from Yorkshire

A type of crested bird common in British farmland and fields, known for its distinctive call and its arrival as a sign that spring is approaching.

To plant seeds in the ground by scattering or placing them, as part of preparing a garden or field for growing crops.

The cold, wintry distance — both physical and emotional — that separates two people who are living apart from each other.

To send or transmit a message in a careful, deliberate way, as if pressing out each word one at a time, like Morse code signals.

Here, the deepest inner selves of two people — the part of a person that feels, yearns, and reaches out for genuine human connection.

Spending most of one's time sitting indoors, doing little physical activity — used here to contrast the speaker's desk-bound life with the man's outdoor labour.

The seasonal rural task of putting seed potatoes into the ground in late winter or early spring, a traditional marker of the agricultural year beginning again.

Genuinely lived and felt, as opposed to experienced at a remove through screens or media — the poem uses the word to question whether physical, outdoor labour makes life more authentic.

To come back to a place after being away — here describing migratory birds arriving again at the start of a new season, signalling a natural cycle.