Alexander Anderson Poems

I know thou wilt. And so to me the past
Is richer from my pleasant days with thee,
And wears a happy memory to me,
...

And quiet Weimar, hush'd of look and staid,
As if she knew the passing stranger came,
Drawn to her by the splendour and the fame
Of her two mighty sons, whose dust is laid
...

And with the murmur of the Rhine will come
Those legends which have flung, as from a sky
We cannot see but with the inner eye,
...

The splendid demon with the lurid eyes,
Wherein, as when a serpent bites its coil
Nearing its death—hate having felt its foil,
Turns back upon itself before it dies.
...

Thou gazest and the picture fades away
Like visions after sleep. But unto thee
One thing remaineth which thou still canst see,
...

In happy grandeur swept the moon,
Her whispers on the silent trees,
While ever like a distant tune
In murmurs came the breeze.
...

I still min' Jock Buchan, the lang gawkie fule,
He was nearly man muckle though still at the schule,
While I was a laddie the penny book in,
Just trying for knowledge, though sweer to begin.
...

He lays his heavy toil aside
To take his mid-day rest;
The anvil, silent, shakes no more
His labour-pulsing breast.
...

Ane sings the lassie that he lo'es,
Gangs daft aboot her lips an' een;
Anither, burns, an' heichts, an' howes,
...

I'm growin' auld, an' no' sae yauld,
Nor yet sae gleg as I ha'e been;
But whiles, when I am a' my lane,
I licht my pipe an' steek my een.
...