Sunday Poetry - Scotland

I'm starting the New Year with a volume of Scottish poems about the sea. It's called Translated Kingdoms & was selected by Jenni Calder. I have a few anthologies on my shelves that I want to read this year & the Sunday Poetry post is a great way to get me started. The picture above (by Gustave Doré from here) isn't of the sea but of the Highlands but it's so beautiful that I had to use it. I also can't get to my camera at the moment to take a picture of the book because Phoebe is asleep on my lap.

Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses was one of my favourite books when I was young. I had a lovely edition with illustrations & I read it often. The poems are often about imagination & play & this one is no exception.

Three of us afloat in the meadow by the swing, 
Three of us aboard in the basket on the lea. 
Winds are in the air, they are blowing in the spring, 
And waves are on the meadow like the waves there are at sea. 

Where shall we adventure, to-day that we’re afloat, 
Wary of the weather and steering by a star? 
Shall it be to Africa, a-steering of the boat, 
To Providence, or Babylon, or off to Malabar? 

Hi! but here’s a squadron a-rowing on the sea— 
Cattle on the meadow a-charging with a roar! 
Quick, and we’ll escape them, they’re as mad as they can be, 
The wicket is the harbour and the garden is the shore.