Select Poetry.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 245, 29 July 1876, Page 3

Select Poetry.

THE HOUR-GLASS. Sparkling, dancing downwards, Merrily drops the sands. While the golden hours so gaily pass, Amid rose, and lily, and soft green grass, Wherefore so eagerly to turn the glass, Oh dimpled baby-hands ? Glittering flashing downwards, In the glow of the April sun, Ah, sweet white fingers and sky blue eyes, And cheeks as rosy as western skies ; "Tis pity in youth's first Paradise, That the sands so swiftly run ! Stealing for ever downwards, Grey tinging their virgin gold. Pulses still quiver, and hearts still beat, But the road grows hard for the tired feet ; Surely the sky had more warmth and heat, And the sands showed brighter of old I Drooping drearily downwards, The evening is well nigh o'er. The brightest and best the river have crossed, The bolt is shot, and the venture lost ; The barque on the last long wave is tossed, The glass needs to turn no more. AFFINITIES. Speeding across blank, lonely waste of snow From your pale palace, reared with wild device In a strange, shadowy land of Arctic ice, O north wind, bitter north wind, whither do you blow ? " Southward, to find my tender, languid love, Who drowses in a clime of tropic haze, Where, through the heavy-odored, silent nights, Great mellow, fervid stars beam out above, And where one sees, through sultry, golden days The mighty Indian temples rear proud heights, And the rich crested palm her green plume raise ! And I, the spirit strong to wreck and kill, I, the stern north wind, terrible to chill, When her warm kisses through my cold lips thrill, I have no will that is not her sweet will !" Bearing to lavish leaves your cadence low, From far-off, indolent lands of bloomful ease, Of gaudy bird and irridescent seas, O south wind, fragrant south wind, whither do you blow; " Northward to find my cruel, white-limbed love, Who dwells where all strange polar glories blaze; Where, through the scintillant-starred, long-lasting nights, Auroral splendors up the dark heaven move, And where one sees, though scant-lit, freezing days, Collosal ice-plinths, full of emerald lights, House the huge walrus in their crystal maze ! And I, the spirit whom all soft dreams fill! I, the bland south wind, that can work no ill, When her cold kisses through my warm lips thrill, My life grows her life, and my will her will!"