The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson (Vailima ed.)/Volume 8/New Poems/Storm
CXCV
STORM
THE narrow lanes are vacant and wet;
The rough wind bullies and blusters about the township.
And spins the vane on the tower
And chases the scurrying leaves,
And the straw in the damp innyard.
See—a girl passes
Tripping gingerly over the pools,
And under her lifted dress
I catch the gleam of a comely, stockinged leg.
Pah! the room stifles me,
Reeking of stale tobacco—
With the four black mealy horrible prints
After Landseer's pictures.
I will go out.
Here the free wind comes with a fuller circle,
Sings, like an angry wasp, in the straining grass
Sings and whistles;
And the hurried flow of rain
Scourges my face and passes.
Behind me, clustered together, the rain-wet roofs of the town
Shine, and the light vane shines as it veers
In the long pale finger of sun that hurries across them to me.
The fresh salt air is keen in my nostrils,
And far down the shining sand
Foam and thunder
And take the shape of the bay in eager mirth
The white-head hungry billows.
The earth shakes
As the semicircle of waters
Stoops and casts itself down;
And far outside in the open,
Wandering gleams of sunshine
Show us the ordered horde that hurries to follow.
Ei! merry companions,
Your madness infects me.
My whole soul rises and falls and leaps and tumbles with you!
I shout aloud and incite you, O white-headed merry companions.
The sight of you alone is better than drinking.
The brazen band is loosened from off my forehead;
My breast and my brain are moistened and cool;
And still I yell in answer
To your hoarse inarticulate voices,
O big, strong, bullying, boisterous waves,
That are of all things in nature the nearest thoughts to human,
Because you are wicked and foolish,
Mad and destructive.