'As like the Woman as you can' - (Thus the New Adam was beguiled) - 'So shall you touch the Perfect Man' - (God in the Garden heard and smiled). 'Your father perished with his day:...
The blackbird sang, the skies were clear and clean We bowled along a road that curved a spine Superbly sinuous and serpentine Thro' silent symphonies of summer green....
A black and glassy float, opaque and still, The loch, at furthest ebb supine in sleep, Reversing, mirrored in its luminous deep The calm grey skies; the solemn spurs of hill;...
I watched you saunter down the sand: Serene and large, the golden weather Flowed radiant round your peacock feather, And glistered from your jewelled hand. Your tawny hair, turned strand on strand...
With a ripple of leaves and a tinkle of streams The full world rolls in a rhythm of praise, And the winds are one with the clouds and beams - Midsummer days! Midsummer days!...
Spring at her height on a morn at prime, Sails that laugh from a flying squall, Pomp of harmony, rapture of rhyme - Youth is the sign of them, one and all....
Fountains that frisk and sprinkle The moss they overspill; Pools that the breezes crinkle; The wheel beside the mill, With its wet, weedy frill; Wind-shadows in the wheat;...
Was I a Samurai renowned, Two-sworded, fierce, immense of bow? A histrion angular and profound? A priest? a porter? - Child, although I have forgotten clean, I know That in the shade of Fujisan,...
Gold or silver, every day, Dies to gray. There are knots in every skein. Hours of work and hours of play Fade away Into one immense Inane. Shadow and substance, chaff and grain, Are as vain...
The beach was crowded. Pausing now and then, He groped and fiddled doggedly along, His worn face glaring on the thoughtless throng The stony peevishness of sightless men....
Crosses and troubles a-many have proved me. One or two women (God bless them!) have loved me. I have worked and dreamed, and I've talked at will. Of art and drink I have had my fill....
The big teetotum twirls, And epochs wax and wane As chance subsides or swirls; But of the loss and gain The sum is always plain. Read on the mighty pall, The weed of funeral...
Do you remember That afternoon - that Sunday afternoon! - When, as the kirks were ringing in, And the grey city teemed With Sabbath feelings and aspects, LEWIS - our LEWIS then,...
Above the Crags that fade and gloom Starts the bare knee of Arthur's Seat; Ridged high against the evening bloom, The Old Town rises, street on street; With lamps bejewelled, straight ahead,...
Here they trysted, here they strayed, In the leafage dewy and boon, Many a man and many a maid, And the morn was merry June. 'Death is fleet, Life is sweet,'...
I am the Reaper. All things with heedful hook Silent I gather. Pale roses touched with the spring, Tall corn in summer, Fruits rich with autumn, and frail winter blossoms - Reaping, still reaping -...