Four short lines, and they hold a whole life in compressed form. The speaker looks back on living in a place called Axe Yard, and the memory is mixed from the start: "blessed pain" puts suffering and gratitude side by side without choosing between them. The river disturbs this life, but it isn't a gentle presence. Calling it "an army without desires" makes it sound huge, relentless and indifferent, moving forward with force but no purpose or feeling.
Against that, the speaker describes himself as "handsome but poor," a plain, slightly wry admission that sounds like someone sizing up his younger self. The last line is the strangest. "Worn chapel of time" suggests something sacred that has been weathered down, and "made this day" seems to say that all this wearing and passing has produced the present moment. The mood is wistful and a little mysterious, tender toward hardship, and aware of time as something both holy and erosive.