Page:The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Vailima Edition, Volume 8, 1922.djvu/578

NEW POEMS I love night in the city,

The lighted streets and the swinging gait of harlots.

I love cool pale morning,

In the empty bye-streets,

With only here and there a female figure,

A slavey with lifted dress and the key in her hand,

A girl or two at play in a corner of waste-land

Tumbling and showing their legs and crying out to me loosely.

CXCII

THE LIGHT-KEEPER

S the steady lenses circle

With a frosty gleam of glass;

And the clear bell chimes,

And the oil brims over the lip of the burner,

Quiet and still at his desk,

The lonely light-keeper

Holds his vigil.

Lured from far,

The bewildered seagull beats

Dully against the lantern;

Yet he stirs not, lifts not his head

From the desk where he reads,

Lifts not his eyes to see

The chill blind circle of night

Watching him through the panes. 564