White Butterflies

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 106, 7 May 1938, Page 18 (Supplement)

White Butterflies

'Twas a farmer , * lad and a farmer's lass, And well they thought to wed; Rut of the butt and of the ben Ket'er a word they said. So merrily, merrily, did they dance The slithery hours away, That never a penny lined the purse From lightsome May to May. The first thread of silver-white In black and golden hair; The first line on a lineiess face Came on them unaware. "Oh, what is this, and what is that?" The witless couple sa'id. "Oh where is now our butt and ben, And where the day ice wedf A word fell out of the toindy blue — "Xever your dance is done Till men shall build on withered leaven, And water up shall run. For beild and sheaf and corner stone The world is not your debtor. With clapperless bell shall you be wed. And book without a letter. The farmer's lot, the farmer's care, When did you ease it ever With aught that weighed above tin' froth Upon a devious riverf Xor chirk nor child of yours shall walk The kindly ways of earth, Xor hail the honest harvest home On gladsome field or garth. The sight of these to landward men Vhall be as salt to eyes, When, tisters of xhe thistledown, They flutter, dip and rise." • ' • • • Behold them, summer's airy mjisk, A futil*, fairy past; They do not go, they do not glide, But flicker, two abreast. Two and two and two abreast, They float and form and part, As kinless as the Borean JAghtx, As far from goal or mart. Good folk, be warned by vanity, And oft, by night and day, Think of the farmer's lad and lass That danced their life away. —JESSIE MACKAY.