"This clamor which pretends to be raised for the safety of religion has almost worn put the very appearance of it, and rendered us not only the most divided but the most immoral people upon the face of the earth."

        ADDISON, Freeholder, No. 37.


Start not, my friend, nor think the Muse will stain
Her classic fingers with the dust profane
Of Bulls, Decrees and all those thundering scrolls
Which took such freedom once with royal souls,[1]
When heaven was yet the pope's exclusive trade,
And kings were damned as fast as now they're made,
No, no--let Duigenan search the papal chair
For fragrant treasures long forgotten there;
And, as the witch of sunless Lapland thinks
That little swarthy gnomes delight in stinks,
Let sall...

I.

I stood in an ancient garden
With high red walls around;
Over them grey and green lichens
In shadowy arabesque wound.

The topmost climbing blossoms
On fields kine-haunted looked out;
But within were shelter and shadow,
With daintiest odours about.

There were alleys and lurking arbours,
Deep glooms into which to dive.
The lawns were as soft as fleeces,
Of daisies I counted but five.

The sun-dial was so aged
It had gathered a thoughtful grace;
'Twas the round-about of the shadow
That so had furrowed its face.

The flowers were all of the oldest
That ever in garden sprung;
Red, and blood-red, and dark purple
The rose-lamps flaming hung.

Along the borders fringed
With broad thick edges of box

Behold her, single in the field,
Yon solitary Highland Lass!
Reaping and singing by herself;
Stop here, or gently pass!
Alone she cuts and binds the grain,
And sings a melancholy strain;
O listen! for the Vale profound
Is overflowing with the sound.

No Nightingale did ever chaunt
More welcome notes to weary bands
Of travellers in some shady haunt,
Among Arabian sands:
A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard
In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,
Breaking the silence of the seas
Among the farthest Hebrides.

Will no one tell me what she sings?
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago:
Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,<...

When I departed am, ring thou my knell,
Thou pitiful and pretty Philomel:
And when I'm laid out for a corse, then be
Thou sexton, redbreast, for to cover me.

In lonely gardens deserted - unseen -
Oh! lovely lilacs of purple and white,
You are dipping down through a mist of green;
For the morning sun's delight.
And the velvet bee, all belted with black,
Drinks deep of the wine which your flagons hold,
Clings close to your plumes while he fills his pack
With a load of burnished gold.

You hide the fences with blossoms of snow,
And sweeten the shade of castle towers;
Over low, grey gables you brightly blow,
Like amethysts turned to flowers.
The tramp on the highway - ragged and bold -
Wears you close to his heart with jaunty air;
You rest in my lady's girdle of gold,
And are held against her hair.

In God's own acre your tender flowers,
Bend down to the grasses and seem to sigh
For those who count ...

Light as the breeze that hails the infant morn
The Milkmaid trips, as o'er her arm she slings
Her cleanly pail, some fav'rite lay she sings
As sweetly wild and cheerful as the horn.
O! happy girl I may never faithless love,
Or fancied splendour, lead thy steps astray;
No cares becloud the sunshine of thy day,
Nor want e'er urge thee from thy cot to rove.
What though thy station dooms thee to be poor,
And by the hard-earn'd morsel thou art fed;
Yet sweet content bedecks thy lowly bed,
And health and peace sit smiling at thy door:
Of these possess'd--thou hast a gracious meed,
Which Heaven's high wisdom gives, to make thee rich indeed!

Many good works I've done and ended,
Ye take the praise I'm not offended;
For in the world, I've always thought
Each thing its true position hath sought.
When praised for foolish deeds am I,
I set off laughing heartily;
When blamed for doing something good,
I take it in an easy mood.
If some one stronger gives me hard blows,
That it's a jest, I feign to suppose:
But if 'tis one that's but my own like,
I know the way such folks to strike.
When Fortune smiles, I merry grow,
And sing in dulci jubilo;
When sinks her wheel, and tumbles me o'er,
I think 'tis sure to rise once more.

In the sunshine of summer I ne'er lament,
Because the winter it cannot prevent;
And when the white snow-flakes fall around,
I don my skates, and am off with a bound.<...

I

Secluded, solitary on some underbough,
Or cradled in a leaf, 'mid glimmering light,
Like Puck thou crouchest: Haply watching how
The slow toadstool comes bulging, moony white,
Through loosening loam; or how, against the night,
The glowworm gathers silver to endow
The darkness with; or how the dew conspires
To hang, at dusk, with lamps of chilly fires
Each blade that shrivels now.

II

O vague confederate of the whippoorwill,
Of owl and cricket and the katydid!
Thou gatherest up the silence in one shrill
Vibrating note and send'st it where, half hid
In cedars, twilight sleeps - each azure lid
Drooping a line of golden eyeball still. -
Afar, yet near, I hear thy dewy voice
Within the Garden of the Hours apoise
On dusk's deep daff...

Tune - "Here's a health to them that's awa."



I.

    Here's a health to ane I lo'e dear;
        Here's a health to ane I lo'e dear;
    Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet,
        And soft as their parting tear - Jessy!

II.

    Altho' thou maun never be mine,
        Altho' even hope is denied;
    'Tis sweeter for thee despairing,
        Then aught in the world beside - Jessy!

III.

    I mourn through the gay, gaudy day,
        As, hopeless, I muse on thy charms:
    But welcome the dream o' sweet slumber,
        For then I am lockt in thy arms - Jessy!

IV.

    I guess by the dear angel smile,
        I guess by the love rolling e'e;
    But why urge the tender...

This is just a place:
we go around, distanced,
yearly in a star's

atmosphere, turning
daily into and out of
direct light and

slanting through the
quadrant seasons: deep
space begins at our

heels, nearly rousing
us loose: we look up
or out so high, sight's

silk almost draws us away:
this is just a place:
currents worry themselves

coiled and free in airs
and oceans: water picks
up mineral shadow and

plasm into billions of
designs, frames: trees,
grains, bacteria: but

is love a reality we
made here ourselves,
and grief, did we design

that, or do these,
like currents, whine
in and out among us merely

as we arrive and go:
this is just a place:
the ...

The wind last night was wild and strong,
It shriek'd, it whistl'd and it roar'd,
And went with whirl and swoop along,
'Mid falling trees and crashing board.

The timbers creak'd, the rafters sway'd,
And e'en some roofs, upheav'd and torn,
Came crashing to the earth, and laid
Before the view, upon the morn.

The air seem'd like some monstrous thing,
By its uncurbed passion held;
Like dreadful dragon on the wing,
So horribly it scream'd and yell'd.

Now venting a triumphant shout,
And ever and anon a groan,
Like fiend from prison lately out,
Or like unhappy chain'd one's moan.

There was a lofty pine I knew;
Each morn and eve I passed it by;
To such a lofty height it grew,
It caught at once each passing eye.

It stood...

When I thy parts run o'er, I can't espy
In any one, the least indecency;
But every line and limb diffused thence
A fair and unfamiliar excellence;
So that the more I look, the more I prove
There's still more cause why I the more should love.

Quaint and forgotten, by an unused road,
An old house stands: around its doors the dense
    Blue iron-weeds grow high;
The chipmunks make a highway of its fence;
And on its sunken flagstones slug and toad
    Silent as lichens lie.

The timid snake upon its hearth's cool sand
Sleeps undisturbed; the squirrel haunts its roof;
    And in the clapboard sides
Of closets, dim with many a spider woof,
Like the uncertain tapping of a hand,
    The beetle-borer hides.

Above its lintel, under mossy eaves,
The mud-wasps build their cells; and in the floor
    Of its neglected porch
The black bees nest. Through each deserted door,
Vague as a phantom's footsteps, steal the leaves,
    And dropped cones of the larch.

But come with me when sunset...

Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met
Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,
And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,
Shows not her sleeve of grey to know her bye.
Woke early, I arose and thought that first
In winter time of all the world was I.
The old owls might have hallooed if they durst,
But joy just then was up and whistled bye
A merry tune which I had known full long,
But could not to my memory wake it back,
Until the ploughman changed it to the song.
O happiness, how simple is thy track.
--Tinged like the willow shoots, the east's young brow
Glows red and finds thee singing at the plough.

Through the sunshine, and through the rain
    Of these changing days of mist and splendour,
I see the face of a year-old pain
    Looking at me with a smile half tender.

With a smile half tender, and yet all sad,
    Into each hour of the mild September
It comes, and finding my life grown glad
    Looks down in my eyes, and says 'Remember.'

Says 'Remember,' and points behind
    To days of sorrow, and tear-wet lashes;
When joy lay dead and hope was blind,
    And nothing was left but dust and ashes.

Dust and ashes and vain regret,
    Flames fanned out, and the embers falling.
But the sun of the saddest day must set,
    And hope wakes ever with Springtime's calling.

With Springtime's calling the pulses thrill;
    And the heart i...

He preached upon "breadth" till it argued him narrow, --
The broad are too broad to define;
And of "truth" until it proclaimed him a liar, --
The truth never flaunted a sign.

Simplicity fled from his counterfeit presence
As gold the pyrites would shun.
What confusion would cover the innocent Jesus
To meet so enabled a man!

Although your wayward brows
Give you a curious air
Angelic not at all,
Witch of the tempting stare,

I love you with a passion
Terrible and odd,
With the obeisance
Of priest to golden god.

The desert and the woods
Embalm your heavy hair;
Your head takes attitudes
Mysterious and rare.

A censer's faint perfume
Prowls along your skin;
You charm as evening charms,
Warm and shadowy Nymph.

Ah! strongest potions stir me
Less than your idleness,
And you can make the dead
Revive with your caress!

Your hips are amorous
Of back and breasts and thighs,
And ravished by your pose
Are cushions where you lie.

Sometimes to appease
A rage that comes in fits,
Serious one, you squander
Bites...

Craigo Woods, wi' the splash o' the cauld rain beatin'
    I' the back end o' the year,
When the clouds hang laigh wi' the weicht o' their load o' greetin'
    And the autumn wind's asteer;
Ye may stand like gaists, ye may fa' i' the blast that's cleft ye
    To rot i' the chilly dew,
But when will I mind on aucht since the day I left ye
    Like I mind on you - on you?

Craigo Woods, i' the licht o' September sleepin'
    And the saft mist o' the morn,
When the hairst climbs to yer feet, an' the sound o' reapin'
    Comes up frae the stookit corn,
And the braw reid puddock-stules are like jewels blinkin'
    And the bramble happs ye baith,
O what do I see, i' the lang nicht, lyin' an' thinkin'
    As I see yer wraith - yer wraith?

There's a road to...