STEVENSON, Robert Louis

Bed in Summer

In winter I get up at night

And dress by yellow candle-light.

In summer, quite the other way,

I have to go to bed by day.

I have to go to bed and see

The birds still hopping on the tree,

Or hear the grown-up people's feet

Still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you,

When all the sky is clear and blue,

And I should like so much to play,

To have to go to bed by day?


The Hayloft

Through all the pleasant meadow-side

The grass grew shoulder-high,

Till the shining scythes went far and wide

And cut it down to dry.

Those green and sweetly smelling crops

They led the waggons home;

And they piled them here in mountain tops

For mountaineers to roam.

Here is Mount Clear, Mount Rusty-Nail,

Mount Eagle and Mount High;—

The mice that in these mountains dwell,

No happier are than I!

Oh, what a joy to clamber there,

Oh, what a place for play,

With the sweet, the dim, the dusty air,

The happy hills of hay!


Requiem

Under the wide and starry sky,

Dig the grave and let me lie.

Glad did I live and gladly die,

And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:

Here he lies where he longed to be;

Home is the sailor, home from sea,

And the hunter home from the hill.