Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

A light that shifts, a glare that drifts,
Rekindling thus and thus,

Not all forlorn, for Thou hast borne
Strange tales to them of us.

Time hath no tide but must abide
The servant of Thy will;

Tide hath no time, for to Thy rhyme
The ranging stars stand still—
Regent of spheres that lock our fears
Our hopes invisible,

Oh 'twas certes at Thy decrees

We fashioned Heaven and Hell!

Pure Wisdom hath no certain path
That lacks thy morning-eyne,
And captains bold by Thee controlled
Most like to Gods design;

Thou art the Voice to kingly boys
To lift them through the fight,
And Comfortress of Unsuccess,
To give the dead good-night-

A veil to draw 'twixt God His Law
And Man's infirmity,

A shadow kind to dumb and blind

The shambles where we die;

A sum to trick th' arithmetic

Too base of leaguing odds,
The spur of trust, the curb of lust,
Thou handmaid of the Gods!

Oh Charity, all patiently

Abiding wrack and scaith!

Oh Faith, that meets ten thousand cheats Yet drops no jot of faith!

Devil and brute Thou dost transmute

To higher, lordlier show,

Who art in sooth that lovely Truth
The careless angels know!

Thy face is far from this our war,
Our call and counter-cry,

I may not find Thee quick and kind,
Nor meet Thee till I die.

Yet may I look with heart unshook
On blow brought home or missed-
Yet may I hear with equal ear

The clarions down the list;
Yet set my lance above mischance
And ride the barriere-

Oh, hit or miss, how little 'tis,

My Lady is not there!

THE FLOWERS.

"To our private taste, there is always something a little exotic, almost artificial, in songs which, under an English aspect and dress, are yet so manifestly the product of other skies. They affect us like translations; the very fauna and flora are alien, remote; the dog's-tooth violet is but an ill substitute for the rathe primrose, nor can we ever believe that the wood-robin sings as sweetly in April as the English thrush."-The Athenæum.

Buy my English posies—
Kent and Surrey may,
Violets of the Undercliff
Wet with Channel spray;
Cowslips from a Devon combe

Midland furze afire—

Buy my English posies,

And I'll sell your hearts' desire!

Buy my English posies!—

You that scorn the may

Won't you greet a friend from home

Half the world away?

Green against the draggled drift,

Faint and frail and first

Buy my Northern blood-root

And I'll know where you were nursed! Robin down the logging-road whistles, "Come to me,"

Spring has found the maple-grove, the sap is running free;

All the winds o' Canada call the ploughing

rain.

Take the flower and turn the hour, and kiss your love again!

Buy my English posies!—

Here's to match your need.

Buy a tuft of royal heath,
Buy a bunch of weed
White as sand of Muysenberg

Spun before the gale

Buy my heath and lilies

And I'll tell you whence you hail!

Under hot Constantia broad the

lie

the vineyards

Throned and thorned the aching berg props the

speckless sky

Slow below the Wynberg firs trails the tilted

wain

Take the flower and turn the hour, and kiss your love again!

Buy my English posies!—
You that will not turn,
Buy my hot-wood clematis,
Buy a frond o' fern

Gathered where the Erskine leaps

Down the road to Lorne

Buy my Christmas creeper

And I'll say where you were born!

West away from Melbourne dust holidays begin— They that mock at Paradise woo at Cora LynnThrough the great South Otway gums sings the great South Main

Take the flower and turn the hour, and kiss your love again!

Buy my English posies!—

Here's your choice unsold!
Buy a blood-red myrtle-bloom,
Buy the kowhai's gold

« AnteriorContinuar »