Nerves in stounds o’ delight,
Muscles in pride o’ power,
Bluid as wi’ roses dight
Life’s toppin’ pinnacles owre,
The thistle yet’ll unite
Man and the Infinite!

Swippert and swith wi’ virr
In the howes o’ man’s hert
Forever its muckle roots stir
Like a Leviathan astert,
Till’ts coils like a thistle’s leafs
Sweep space wi’ levin sheafs.

Frae laichest deeps o’ the ocean
It rises in flight upon flight,
And ’yont its uttermaist motion
Can still set roses alight,
As else unreachable height
Fa’s under its triumphin’ sight.

Here is the root that feeds
The shank wi’ the blindin’ wings
Dwinin’ abuneheid to gleids
Like stars in their keethin’ rings,
And blooms in sunrise and sunset
Inowre Eternity’s yett.

Lay haud o’ my hert and feel
Fountains ootloupin’ the starns
Or see the Universe reel
Set gaen’ by my eident harns,
Or test the strength o’ my spauld
The wecht o’ a’ thing to hauld!

—The howes o’ Man’s hert are bare,
The Dragon’s left them for good,
There’s nocht but naethingness there,
The hole whaur the Thistle stood,
That rootless and radiant flies
A Phoenix in Paradise!…

from A Drunk Man Looks at Throbbing Thistle