I have desired to go
Where springs not fail,
To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail,
And a few lilies blow.
And I have asked to be
Where no storms come,
Where the green swell is in the havens dumb,
And out of the swing of the sea.
If you were twenty-seven
and had done time for beating
our ex-wife and had
no dreams you remembered
in the morning, you might
lie on your bed and listen
to a mad canary sing
and think it all right to be
there every Saturday
ignoring your neighbors, the streets,
the signs that said join,
and the need to be helping.
You might build, as he did,
a network of golden ladders
so that the bird could roam
on all levels of the room;
you might paint the ceiling blue,
‘Ye have robb’d,’ said he, ‘ye have slaughter’d and made an end,
Take your ill-got plunder, and bury the dead:
What will ye more of your guest and sometime friend?’
‘Blood for our blood,’ they said.
He laugh’d: ‘If one may settle the score for five,
I am ready; but let the reckoning stand till day:
I have loved the sunlight as dearly as any alive.’
‘You shall die at dawn,’ said they.
He flung his empty revolver down the slope,
He climb’d alone to the Eastward edge of the trees;
Evening was in the wood, louring with storm.
A time of drought had sucked the weedy pool
And baked the channels; birds had done with song.
Thirst was a dream of fountains in the moon,
Or willow-music blown across the water
Leisurely sliding on by weir and mill.
Uneasy was the man who wandered, brooding,
His face a little whiter than the dusk.
A drone of sultry wings flicker'd in his head.
The end of sunset burning thro' the boughs
Died in a smear of red; exhausted hours
HAME, hame, hame, O hame fain wad I be--
O hame, hame, hame, to my ain countree!
When the flower is i' the bud and the leaf is on the tree,
The larks shall sing me hame in my ain countree;
Hame, hame, hame, O hame fain wad I be--
O hame, hame, hame, to my ain countree!
The green leaf o' loyaltie 's beginning for to fa',
The bonnie White Rose it is withering an' a';
But I'll water 't wi' the blude of usurping tyrannie,
An' green it will graw in my ain countree.
Green grow the rashes, O!
Green grow the rashes, O!
The sweetest hours that e'er I spend,
Are spent amang the lasses, O!
There's nought but care on every han'
In every hour that passes, O;
What signifies the life o' man,
An 'twere na for the lasses, O?
The warl'ly race may riches chase,
An' riches still may fly them, O;
An' though at last they catch them fast,
Their hearts can ne'er enjoy them, O.
But gi'e me a canny hour at e'en,
My arms about my dearie, O,
Somehow the skies don't seem so blue
As they used to be;
Blossoms have a fainter hue,
Grass less green I see.
There's no twinkle in a star,
Dawns don't seem so gold . . .
Yet, of course, I know they are:
Guess I'm growing old.
II
Somehow sunshine seems less bright,
Birds less gladly sing;
Moons don't thrill me with delight,
There's no kick in Spring.
Hills are steeper now and I'm
Sensitive to cold;
Lines are not so keen to rhyme . . .
While for me gapes the greedy grave
It don't make sense
That I should have a crazy crave
To paint our fence.
Yet that is what I aim to do,
Though dim my sight:
Jest paint them aged pickets blue,
Or green or white.
II
Jest squat serenely in the sun
Wi' brush an' paint,
An' gay them pickets one by one,
--A chore! It ain't.
The job is joy. Although I'm slow
I save expense:
So folks, let me before I go,
A piece of green pepper
fell
off the wooden salad bowl:
so what?
Sunflower tall and hollyhock, that wave in the
wind together,
Corn-flower, poppy, and marigold, blossoming
fair and fine,
Delicate sweet-peas, glowing bright in the quiet
autumn weather,
While over the fence, on fire with bloom,
climbs the nasturtium vine!
Quaint little wilderness of flowers, straggling
hither and thither -
morning-glories tangled about the larkspur
gone to seed,
Scarlet runners that burst all bounds, and wan-
der, heaven knows whither,
