Works

When you had played with life a space
And made it drink and lust and sing,
You flung it back into God's face
And thought you did a noble thing.
"Lo, I have lived and loved," you said,...

To me, like hauntings of a vagrant breath
From some far forest which I once have known,
The perfume of this flower of verse is blown.
Tho' seemingly soul-blossoms faint to death,...

Verse. My God, I'm wounded by my sin,
And sore without, and sick within.
Ver. Chor. I come to Thee, in hope to find
Salve for my body and my mind.
Verse. In Gilead though no balm be found...

The silence of traitorous feet!
The silence of close-pent rage!
The roar, and the sudden heart-beat!
And the shot through the true heart going,
The truest heart of the age!...

For all thy many courtesies to me,
Nothing I have, my Crofts, to send to thee
For the requital, save this only one
Half of my just remuneration.
For since I've travell'd all this realm throughout...

To this white temple of my heroes here,
Beset with stately figures everywhere
Of such rare saintships, who did here consume
Their lives in sweets, and left in death perfume,...

I can but name thee, and methinks I call
All that have been, or are canonical
For love and bounty to come near, and see
Their many virtues volum'd up in thee;
In thee, brave man! whose incorrupted fame...

Welcome to this my college, and though late
Thou'st got a place here (standing candidate)
It matters not, since thou art chosen one
Here of my great and good foundation.

Seeing thee, Soame, I see a goodly man,
And in that good a great patrician.
Next to which two, among the city powers
And thrones, thyself one of those senators;
Not wearing purple only for the show,...

When I consider, dearest, thou dost stay
But here awhile, to languish and decay;
Like to these garden glories, which here be
The flowery-sweet resemblances of thee:...

Next is your lot, fair, to be number'd one,
Here, in my book's canonisation:
Late you come in; but you a saint shall be,
In chief, in this poetic liturgy.

Since, for thy full deserts, with all the rest
Of these chaste spirits that are here possest
Of life eternal, time has made thee one
For growth in this my rich plantation,...

Nor is my number full till I inscribe
Thee, sprightly Soame, one of my righteous tribe;
A tribe of one lip, leaven, and of one
Civil behaviour, and religion;
A stock of saints, where ev'ry one doth wear...

1.
The keen stars were twinkling,
And the fair moon was rising among them,
Dear Jane!
The guitar was tinkling,
But the notes were not sweet till you sung them
Again.

2....

O Goudie! terror of the Whigs,
Dread of black coats and rev'rend wigs,
Sour Bigotry, on her last legs,
Girnin', looks back,
Wishin' the ten Egyptian plagues
Wad seize you quick.
...

Whereas, good friend, it doth appear
You do possess the notion
To his awhile away from here
To lands across the ocean;
Now, by these presents we would show
That, wheresoever wend you,...

Now, Kennedy, if foot or horse
E'er bring you in by Mauchline Cross,
L--d, man, there's lasses there wad force
A hermit's fancy.
And down the gate in faith they're worse
And mair unchancy.
...

Sweet Love and I had oft communed;
We were, indeed, great friends,
And oft I sought his office, near
Where Courtship Alley ends.

I used to sit with him, and smoke,
And talk of your blue eyes,...

Still must the poet as of old,
In barren attic bleak and cold,
Starve, freeze, and fashion verses to
Such things as flowers and song and you;

Still as of old his being give...

Love blows as the wind blows,
Love blows into the heart.
- Nile Boat-Song


Life in her creaking shoes
Goes, and more formal grows,
A round of calls and cues:...