Vol 2: The Boat in the Farmyard and other poetry

Poems in Category: The Boat in the Farmyard and other poetry

An unpublished collection written in 1925-1926.
W T Quirk’s dedication: “Dedicated to my mother, who first taught me the value of friendship.”

For an alphabetical list of titles of these poems Click here

Anna Moyra

There is music in the field
Where the reapers keen scythes wield
In the corn stalks half-concealed:
“Anna Moyra!”
Who ...

Broken Bell

(Translated from the French of Charles Baudelaire)

‘Tis bitter-sweet on cold and wintry nights
To sit beside a fire that ...

Castle Rushen

See where the mighty keep its form uprears
In lofty grandeur to the pondering sky.
See the majestic pile there ...

Close of Day

Tranquil mere in sunset light,
Mirror of gold:
On thy breast doth radiance pour,
Shady trees thine edge embower,
All ...

December

Now last of all here comes cold proud December;
Last lies it on the calendar, not least.
Glowing alone, the ...

Failure

A ship sailed out into the golden west,
Her sails were set and bellied in the breeze.
But battered she ...

Fire Fancies

The fire grows low, the embers fall apart,
The room grows dark and shadows steal around;
I gaze and gaze ...

Foxdale Eve

I seem to hear the rallying call
When daylight fades and shadows fall
And dusk is creeping up the glen,...

Foxdale Stream

FOXDALE STREAM

I.

O singing stream, I take one tender look
At thy clear crystal depths in childish speed
Dancing ...

From the Lowliest

Of commonplace things and commonplace life we dream.
In commonplace homes and commonplace streets we live.
Humble and poor and ...

House Fever

(The sixth of the Black Hole Ballads)
(With apologies to Walter Scott)

Breathes there a boy with soul so dead...

Isle of Man

Green-mantled isle of rock-bound coast and hills,
Of smiling fields and hedgerows bright with flowers,
Of happy memories of leisured ...

November

Oh, month of withered leaves and leaping fires!
Oh, month of tossing seas and storms of hail;
When sun each ...

October

Now hath the summer gone and autumn come
And old October hath her raiment donned
And gathered tatters for her ...

Odelet

(From the French of Henri de Regnier)

If I have Sunday
Of my love, ‘tis to the water slow
Which ...

Our Baby

(The third of the Black Hole Ballads)
(With apologies to a popular song)

Everybody loves our baby but our baby ...

Peel Castle

Older companion of thy southern friend,
Older by far of the Manx castles twain,
Thy pomp and splendour shall we ...

Puny Man

Upon a rugged promontry I stood,
And round the wheeling screaming seagulls flew.
The angry surf murmured and frothed below...

Solace

Not for my eyes are Arcadia’s fountains
When I am tired and sore depressed.
Not for my feet are Alpine ...

Summer Night

Oh, hasten out! Leave in thy rear that room
Where music reigns discordant; dancers gay
Flit o’er the polished surface ...

The Choosing

My boy, that road leads to the distant town,
And this one stretches to the waiting sea.
Hast thou determined ...

The Dead Son

Long shadows are creeping,
The day’s almost done;
A mother kneels weeping
Beside her dead son.

“That Thou could’st have ...

The Epitaph

Here rests his head upon a Tennis Pill,
A youth, to Fortune lost, from Ping-Pong flown;
Fair Science smiled not ...

The Marsh

A darksome stillness broods o’er all,
The breeze is dank and chill,
And there beneath a covering pall
Its moonless ...

The Pioneer

The sun swims down, in golden splendour clad,
And earth prepares the coming night to meet;
The night urged on ...

The Rainbow

A sheet of water from a leaden sky
Fell solid, and damply clinging mist
Rose thick and white. The passing ...

The Sunset

The lulled waters swell and murmur low
Beneath the crags and cliffs and come to rest
Upon the shingle in ...

To a Jackdaw

Night claims its fee and takes to it the land,
And shadows lengthen; dusk on either hand
Makes dark spots ...

To Death

Death, why dost thou hard stare at me, I pray?
Why smilest thou in manner grimly cold?
And what is ...

To Her

I

The sky was clear, the sky was blue. No cloud
Floated to mar the pure serenity
Of the deep ...

To Keats

Sometimes the moon sails in the frosty sky
Like a white ship, majestic and supreme.
Sometimes it rises early then ...

To Mary

(From the French of Pierre de Ronsard)

As one sees on a stem a rose in May
In all its ...

Tom Brown

Tom Brown, thy little Isle reveres thy name,
Poet magnificent! Thine immortal fame
Hath long outlived thee, and will long ...