“September has come, it is hersWhose vitality leaps in the autumn,Whose nature prefersTrees without leaves and a fire in the fireplace.So I give her this month and the nextThough the whole of my year should be hers who has rendered alreadySo many of its days intolerable or perplexedBut so many more so happy.Who has left a scent on my life, and left my wallsDancing over and over with her shadowWhose hair is twined in all my waterfallsAnd all of London littered with remembered kisses.”

“A city built upon mud;A culture built upon profit;Free speech nipped in the bud,The minority always guilty.Why should I want to go backTo you, Ireland, my Ireland?...Her mountains are still blue, her rivers flowBubbling over the boulders.She is both a bore and a bitch;Better close the horizon,Send her no more fantasy, no more longings whichAre under a fatal tariff.For common sense is the vogueAnd she gives her children neither sense nor moneyWho slouch around the world with a gesture and a brogueAnd a faggot of useless memories.”

“Cradle Song for Eleanor”: Sleep, my darling, sleep; The pity of it all Is all we compass if We watch disaster fall. Put off your twenty-odd Encumbered years and creep Into the only heaven, The robbers’ cave of sleep. The wild grass will whisper, Lights of passing cars Will streak across your dreams And fumble at the stars; Life will tap the window Only too soon again, Life will have her answer – Do not ask her when. When the winsome bubble Shivers, when the bough Breaks, will be the moment But not here or now. Sleep and, asleep, forget The watchers on the wall Awake all night who know The pity of it all.”

“I cannot drug my life with the present moment;The present moment may rape--but all in vain--The future, for the future remains a virginWho must be tried again.”

“Fanfare for the MakersA cloud of witnesses. To whom? To what?To the small fire that never leaves the sky.To the great fire that boils the daily pot.To all the things we are not remembered by,Which we remember and bless. To all the thingsThat will not notice when we die,Yet lend the passing moment words and wings.So fanfare for the Makers: who composeA book of words or deeds who runs may writeAs many who do run, as a family growsAt times like sunflowers turning towards the light.As sometimes in the blackout and the raidsOne joke composed an island in the night.As sometimes one man’s kindness pervadesA room or house or village, as sometimesMerely to tighten screws or sharpen bladesCan catch a meaning, as to hear the chimesAt midnight means to share them, as one manIn old age plants an avenue of limesAnd before they bloom can smell them, before they spanThe road can walk beneath the perfected arch,The merest greenprint when the lives beganOf those who walk there with him, as in defaultOf coffee men grind acorns, as in despiteOf all assaults conscripts counter assault,As mothers sit up late night after nightMoulding a life, as miners day by dayDescend blind shafts, as a boy may flaunt his kiteIn an empty nonchalant sky, as anglers playTheir fish, as workers work and can take prideIn spending sweat before they draw their pay.As horsemen fashion horses while they ride,As climbers climb a peak because it is there,As life can be confirmed even in suicide:To make is such. Let us make. And set the weather fair.Louis Macneice”

“Bagpipe Music'It's no go the merrygoround, it's no go the rickshaw,All we want is a limousine and a ticket for the peepshow.Their knickers are made of crêpe-de-chine, their shoes are made of python,Their halls are lined with tiger rugs and their walls with heads of bison.John MacDonald found a corpse, put it under the sofa,Waited till it came to life and hit it with a poker,Sold its eyes for souvenirs, sold its blood for whiskey,Kept its bones for dumb-bells to use when he was fifty.It's no go the Yogi-Man, it's no go Blavatsky,All we want is a bank balance and a bit of skirt in a taxi.Annie MacDougall went to milk, caught her foot in the heather,Woke to hear a dance record playing of Old Vienna.It's no go your maidenheads, it's no go your culture,All we want is a Dunlop tyre and the devil mend the puncture.The Laird o' Phelps spent Hogmanay declaring he was sober,Counted his feet to prove the fact and found he had one foot over.Mrs Carmichael had her fifth, looked at the job with repulsion,Said to the midwife 'Take it away; I'm through with overproduction'.It's no go the gossip column, it's no go the Ceilidh,All we want is a mother's help and a sugar-stick for the baby.Willie Murray cut his thumb, couldn't count the damage,Took the hide of an Ayrshire cow and used it for a bandage.His brother caught three hundred cran when the seas were lavish,Threw the bleeders back in the sea and went upon the parish.It's no go the Herring Board, it's no go the Bible,All we want is a packet of fags when our hands are idle.It's no go the picture palace, it's no go the stadium,It's no go the country cot with a pot of pink geraniums,It's no go the Government grants, it's no go the elections,Sit on your arse for fifty years and hang your hat on a pension.It's no go my honey love, it's no go my poppet;Work your hands from day to day, the winds will blow the profit.The glass is falling hour by hour, the glass will fall for ever,But if you break the bloody glass you won't hold up the weather.”

“Prayer before BirthI am not yet born; O hear me.Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the club-footed ghoul come near me.I am not yet born, console me.I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me, with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me, on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.I am not yet born; provide meWith water to dandle me, grass to grow for me, trees to talk to me, sky to sing to me, birds and a white light in the back of my mind to guide me.I am not yet born; forgive meFor the sins that in me the world shall commit, my words when they speak me, my thoughts when they think me, my treason engendered by traitors beyond me, my life when they murder by means of my hands, my death when they live me.I am not yet born; rehearse meIn the parts I must play and the cues I must take when old men lecture me, bureaucrats hector me, mountains frown at me, lovers laugh at me, the white waves call me to folly and the desert calls me to doom and the beggar refuses my gift and my children curse me.I am not yet born; O hear me,Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is God come near me.I am not yet born; O fill meWith strength against those who would freeze my humanity, would dragoon me into a lethal automaton, would make me a cog in a machine, a thing with one face, a thing, and against all those who would dissipate my entirety, would blow me like thistledown hither and thither or hither and thither like water held in the hands would spill me.Let them not make me a stone and let them not spill me.Otherwise kill me.”