| This darksome burn, horseback brown, |
| His rollrock highroad roaring down, |
| In coop and in comb the fleece of his
foam |
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.
|
| A windpuff-bonnet of fáwn-fróth |
| Turns and twindles over the broth |
| Of a pool so pitchblack, féll-frówning, |
It rounds and rounds Despair to
drowning.
|
| Degged with dew, dappled with dew |
| Are the groins of the braes that the
brook treads through, |
| Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern, |
And the beadbonny ash that sits over
the burn.
|
| What would the world be, once bereft |
| Of wet and of wildness ? Let them be left, |
| O let them be left, wildness and wet ; |
Long live the weeds and the wilderness
yet.
|
