Ha' we lost the goodliest fere o' all
For the priests and the gallows tree?
Aye lover he was of brawny men,
O' ships and the open sea.
When they came wi' a host to take Our Man
His smile was good to see,
"First let these go!" quo' our Goodly Fere,
"Or I'll see ye damned," says he.
......
Cruising these residential Sunday
streets in dry August sunlight:
what offends us is
the sanities:
the houses in pedantic rows, the planted
sanitary trees, assert
levelness of surface like a rebuke
to the dent in our car door.
No shouting here, or
shatter of glass; nothing more abrupt
......
I
1 Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knife us ...
2 Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent ...
3 Low drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient ...
4 Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
5 But nothing happens.
6 Watching, we hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire.
7 Like twitching agonies of men among its brambles.
......
When I was a windy boy and a bit
And the black spit of the chapel fold,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of women),
I tiptoed shy in the gooseberry wood,
The rude owl cried like a tell-tale tit,
I skipped in a blush as the big girls rolled
Nine-pin down on donkey's common,
And on seesaw sunday nights I wooed
Whoever I would with my wicked eyes,
The whole of the moon I could love and leave
......
I should like to rise and go
Where the golden apples grow;--
Where below another sky
Parrot islands anchored lie,
And, watched by cockatoos and goats,
Lonely Crusoes building boats;--
Where in sunshine reaching out
Eastern cities, miles about,
Are with mosque and minaret
Among sandy gardens set,
......
House
He had a small but practical house
He quickly gets ready wherever he goes
A house, like a house, a little home, whatever you choose
But to have a house that goes with you
It must be a snail, a hermit crab, or Peter
This is the story of Peter's house that fits on his shoulder
Sometimes blisters him all the way
So Petar stops and fixes it
......
In a mass of blooms
sits a summer house all gold
on a sandy beach
Momentous waves each moment
of drama filled beauty days
Near the coral lane
adjoining bright reds and plums
beneath blues and cream
Orange and yellows in front
......
The house in the yellow daisies,
is captivated by breezy graces,
near a meadow very green.
Bluebirds flutter by in summer,
scarlet berry bushes to plunder,
where nature is queen.
Gold stars flash all springtime,
when crickets call for nighttime,
......
It has been ages since the laughter died, which was many suns ago,
Soon swept away by fleeting time, like the brief giggle of a rainbow.
My vacant halls now are silent, and the flower garden is overgrown,
Effusing rich and cloying fragrance, lovely nature reclaiming its own.
The tree boughs are overhanging, the bushes begging to be pruned,
Like a piano that once made beautiful music, is begging to be tuned.
The fruit trees so long neglected, has left fruit rotting on the ground,
......
House of sun,
where the colors sing.
Sunroom blooms!
Inner bliss
and adventures in perfume,
at sunset or noon.
Spring air wafts,
warm through the window-
Peach rose prance!
......