W. T. Quirk – Manx Poet & Writer

A dim and lovely region full of shade,

Brown leaves that spread a carpet for the feet;

An aisle between ...

A spirit fascinating, ageless dwells

Besides the glinting streams where rocks abound,

Where young and vigorous cataracts swift dash

Homing ...

At bluebell time the light of heaven

Is caught and held in many a glen,

As though some extra grace ...

At Bluebell Time

At bluebell time the light of heaven

Is caught and held in many a glen,

As though ...

O harbinger of more expansive days,

Your double fluting falls upon my ears

With all the sudden magic of lost ...

What do you see in the glen of Ballure,

You who walk through it so casually

Your mind full of ...

The dear worn face of Ellan Vannin holds

For me an ever-growing loveliness.

Tender in leas and stern in wilderness,...

For joy a smile,

For sorrow tears,

For friendship an unburdened heart.

‘Tis not worth while

To count the years;...

For joy a smile,

For sorrow tears,

For friendship an unburdened heart

‘Tis not worthwhile

To count the years;

Time ...

A glinting stream

Frets over the stones in the chine,

Murmurs its way through the pebbles,

Curling and swirling

And ...

There are, for those who seek retreat

From the hard-pressing demons of the city street,

From the insistent clamour of ...

A rift within twin cliffs precipitous

Splits the grim granite to the eastern sea

And a thin fringe of shelving ...

She who took such delight

In all God’s creatures, all His flowers,

Was with us then,

Her eyes filled with ...

There is a glen whose lichened boles

Straight as cathedral columns stand;

A place wherein the humbler souls,

Barred from ...

Let me address the shade of Walter Scott !

Oh, great romantic heart, were you indeed

A visitor to this ...

The gentle slopes of Manxland’s hills descend

Into no lovelier glen than this, I ween,

With plunging falls and fir-treed ...

Glen Lough

Just in off the high road,

Through a sagging gate,

Serpentine the pathway

Winds where tall trees wait....

The lovely glens of this green isle

Were one-time avenues of delight,

Where Nature at her work could smile

Before ...

The ribboned water falls with gentle sound

From mossy stone to darkly limpid pool,

Which boils and bubbles to the ...

If you should, in some frantic grief, revile

The hand of fate, and at the Godhead scream,

Not understanding the ...

Go not into Gleneedle,

Not when the moon is new;

Lest you should meet

On silent feet

A youthful ghostly ...

You will never come again,

You who were so gay

That summer’s day.

You will never laugh again

In quite ...

With eyes that show no pity, no remorse,

The moon looks down upon this lonely glen;

She steals the gold ...

Away in the green glen a streamlet’s song,

As it chatters and bubbles the stones among,

Proclaims “I live!” as ...

The day was fair, the sun was warm,

And I for once was free from work.

Nature looked innocent of ...

I do not know a sweeter sound

Than rain upon a thirsty ground;

A lovelier sight I’ll never see

Than ...

The silver sea, the golden sand,

The smiling meadows green and fair;

The beaming sun, the azure sky,

The charmed ...

When water falls,

Dropping headlong in abandonment,

Dashing on rocks in ecstasy,

Kissing and sliding on the impersonal walls,

It ...

The galaxies of silver gleams

That deck the drapery of night

And shed upon the forest streams

Their powdering of ...

Why gild the lily ?

Is it not fair enough

Without the artifice that man, in pride of his

Intelligence ...

The glens are old:

And they have called to other ears

Than ours

In backward swinging long-forgotten years

In which ...

Below the mountain’s flank

Uprearing to the sky,

Where spur and rock and shoulder rank

Round snaefell’s majesty,

Deep ...

Tom Brown, your little isle reveres your name!

Poet of Manxland, your immortal fame

Has long out-lived you, and will ...