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Trespassing

Walter Wingate

The road was liker a burn :
But the trees in the glen were new in leaf,
Ilk bairn I met had a primrose sheaf,
And I couldna think to turn.

Was ever a road like yon !
But the flowers were thick and the birds in tune
In the lown at the back o’ the afternoon,
And aye they wiled me on.

If ye had seen my shoon !
But a muirfowl rase at my vera feet,
And I heard the whaup and the peesweep greet,
And the laverocks sang abune.

And oh ! but the air was sweet,
As hedge by hedge I slinkit about
Till I cam’ to a yett that loot me out –
I wasna blithe to see’t !

And I thocht as my han’ was thrang
Wi’ tates o’ fog at my glaury heel,
“ There’s never a road can please sae weel
As the road we sudna gang.”


Walter Wingate

from Poems (London, Glasgow: Gowans and Gray, 1919)

Tags:

nostalgia raiders Scots Scots spring walking
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Walter Wingate1865 - 1918

Poet and schoolmaster, Walter Wingate was the author of 'The Sair Finger', the much-loved recitation piece about the wean with the skelf in his pinkie (child with a splinter in his little finger!).
More about Walter Wingate

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