Written with a Pencil over the Chimney-Piece in the Parlour of the Inn at Kenmore, Taymouth. ADMIRING Nature in her wildest grace, The lawns wood-fringed in Nature's native taste ; And injured Worth forget and pardon man. TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY, ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH, IN APRIL, 1786. WEE, modest, crimson-tipped flower, Thy slender stem; To spare thee now is past my power, Alas! it's no thy neebor sweet, When upward-springing, blithe, to greet, Cauld blew the bitter-biting north Upon thy early, humble birth; Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth Amid the storm, Scarce rear'd above the parent earth The flaunting flowers our gardens yield, High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield; But thou, beneath the random bield O' clod or stane, Adorns the histie stibble-field, Unseen, alane. で There, in thy scanty mantle clad, But now the share uptears thy bed, And low thou lies! Such is the fate of artless maid, Sweet floweret of the rural shade! By love's simplicity betray'd, And guileless trust, Till she, like thee, all soil'd, is laid Such is the fate of simple bard, Of prudent lore, Till billows rage, and gales blow hard, Such fate to suffering worth is given, Who long with wants and woes has striven, By human pride or cunning driven To misery's brink; Till, wrench'd of every stay but Heaven, E'en thou who mourn'st the daisy's fate, Till crush'd beneath the furrow's weight, Shall be thy doom! THE LAMENT. OCCASIONED BY THE UNFORTUNATE ISSUE OF A FRIEND'S AMOUR. Alas! how oft does Goodness wound itself, Home. O THOU pale orb, that silent shines, And wanders here to wail and weep! Beneath thy wan unwarming beam; And mourn, in lamentation deep, How life and love are all a dream. I joyless view thy rays adorn The faintly-marked distant hill : Thou busy power, Remembrance, cease! For ever bar returning peace? No idly-feign'd poetic pains My sad, love-lorn lamentings claim; Encircled in her clasping arms, How have the raptured moments flown! How have I wish'd for fortune's charms, For her dear sake, and her's alone! And must I think it? is she gone, My secret heart's exulting boast? O! can she bear so base a heart, The plighted husband of her youth? Her way may lie through rough distress! Then, who her pangs and pains will soothe; Her sorrows share, and make them less? Ye winged hours that o'er us pass'd, My fondly-treasured thoughts employ'd. And not a wish to gild the gloom! The morn that warns th' approaching day That I must suffer, lingering, slow. |