An Anthology of Australian Verse | Page 8

ethereal hands.
William Forster.
`The Love in her Eyes lay Sleeping'
The love in her eyes lay sleeping,?As stars that unconscious shine,?Till, under the pink lids peeping,?I wakened it up with mine;?And we pledged our troth to a brimming oath
In a bumper of blood-red wine.?Alas! too well I know?That it happened long ago;?Those memories yet remain,?And sting, like throbs of pain,?And I'm alone below,?But still the red wine warms, and the rosy goblets glow;
If love be the heart's enslaver,?'Tis wine that subdues the head.?But which has the fairest flavour,?And whose is the soonest shed??Wine waxes in power in that desolate hour?When the glory of love is dead.?Love lives on beauty's ray,?But night comes after day,?And when the exhausted sun?His high career has run,?The stars behind him stay,?And then the light that lasts consoles our darkening way.
When beauty and love are over,?And passion has spent its rage,?And the spectres of memory hover,?And glare on life's lonely stage,?'Tis wine that remains to kindle the veins?And strengthen the steps of age.?Love takes the taint of years,?And beauty disappears,?But wine in worth matures?The longer it endures,?And more divinely cheers,?And ripens with the suns and mellows with the spheres.
James Lionel Michael.
`Through Pleasant Paths'
Through pleasant paths, through dainty ways,
Love leads my feet;?Where beauty shines with living rays,
Soft, gentle, sweet;?The placid heart at random strays,?And sings, and smiles, and laughs and plays,?And gathers from the summer days
Their light and heat,?That in its chambers burn and blaze
And beam and beat.
I throw myself among the ferns
Under the shade,?And watch the summer sun that burns
On dell and glade;?To thee, my dear, my fancy turns,?In thee its Paradise discerns,?For thee it sighs, for thee it yearns,
My chosen maid;?And that still depth of passion learns
Which cannot fade.
The wind that whispers in the night,
Subtle and free,?The gorgeous noonday's blinding light,
On hill and tree,?All lovely things that meet my sight,?All shifting lovelinesses bright,?Speak to my heart with calm delight,
Seeming to be?Cloth'd with enchantment, robed in white,
To sing of thee.
The ways of life are hard and cold
To one alone;?Bitter the strife for place and gold --
We weep and groan:?But when love warms the heart grows bold;?And when our arms the prize enfold,?Dearest! the heart can hardly hold
The bliss unknown,?Unspoken, never to be told --
My own, my own!
Personality
"Death is to us change, not consummation."
Heart of Midlothian.
A change! no, surely, not a change,?The change must be before we die;?Death may confer a wider range,?From pole to pole, from sea to sky,?It cannot make me new or strange?To mine own Personality!
For what am I? -- this mortal flesh,?These shrinking nerves, this feeble frame,?For ever racked with ailments fresh?And scarce from day to day the same --?A fly within the spider's mesh,?A moth that plays around the flame!
THIS is not I -- within such coil?The immortal spirit rests awhile:?When this shall lie beneath the soil,?Which its mere mortal parts defile,?THAT shall for ever live and foil?Mortality, and pain, and guile.
Whatever Time may make of me?Eternity must see me still?Clear from the dross of earth, and free?From every stain of every ill;?Yet still, where-e'er -- what-e'er I be,?Time's work Eternity must fill.
When all the worlds have ceased to roll,?When the long light has ceased to quiver?When we have reached our final goal?And stand beside the Living River,?This vital spark -- this loving soul,?Must last for ever and for ever.
To choose what I must be is mine,?Mine in these few and fleeting days,?I may be if I will, divine,?Standing before God's throne in praise, --?Through all Eternity to shine?In yonder Heaven's sapphire blaze.
Father, the soul that counts it gain?To love Thee and Thy law on earth,?Unchanged but free from mortal stain,?Increased in knowledge and in worth,?And purified from this world's pain,?Shall find through Thee a second birth.
A change! no surely not a change!?The change must be before we die;?Death may confer a wider range?From world to world, from sky to sky,?It cannot make me new or strange?To mine own Personality!
Daniel Henry Deniehy.
Love in a Cottage
A cottage small be mine, with porch?Enwreathed with ivy green,?And brightsome flowers with dew-filled bells,?'Mid brown old wattles seen.
And one to wait at shut of eve,?With eyes as fountain clear,?And braided hair, and simple dress,?My homeward step to hear.
On summer eves to sing old songs,?And talk o'er early vows,?While stars look down like angels' eyes?Amid the leafy boughs.
When Spring flowers peep from flossy cells,?And bright-winged parrots call,?In forest paths be ours to rove?Till purple evenings fall.
The curtains closed, by taper clear?To read some page divine,?On winter nights, the hearth beside,?Her soft, warm hand in mine.
And so to glide through busy life,?Like some small brook alone,?That winds its way 'mid grassy knolls,?Its music all its own.
A Song for the Night
O the Night, the Night, the solemn Night,?When Earth is bound with her silent zone,?And the spangled sky seems a temple wide,?Where the star-tribes kneel at the Godhead's throne;?O the Night, the