A Plea for Poetry

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12199, 25 July 1925, Page 15

A Plea for Poetry

| (By Doroen Dawson} $ ?oooooooooooooooooooooooo»

. 1 People who say they have no time” for' poetry mein one of two things; either that they liter-, ally cannot spare the time to reed if in a busy, work-a-day life; or that,- in the modernsense, they have neither time .nor use for. it, ‘ For the letter there U no hope! But it is to the .former -I would proffer my suggestion. ' If the daytime is .really, so .fully occupied that poetry-reeding, even for a quarter of- an hour, is impossible,, there is always the .little “read in bed” that numbers of us indulge. in. ‘‘ ’ THE IDEAL TIME

Truly, I believe this is this ideal time. Those of us who feel that the world would be, a : much sorrier, place ; without the poets can choose no better'time than at the 'end of a jarring day to recapture serenity of spirit, end a conviction that there are' still things of the spirit to enchant us in .this material worlds SWEETER SLUMBER Whan we open the pages of our favourite poet, it is not long before the cares of the day have fallen from ps tike a wornout mantle. It is the magic of true poetry-—|n which it transcends. the noblest prose—that it can attain what is unattainable in any other form of the written word. It says for us all that we cannot say for ourselves. It captures, in exquisite wordmusic, the elusive harmonies that our hearts hear faintly, but that vanish before we grasp their significance. It is the poet who . takes up the harmony, end makes it beautifully intelligible and complete, until we have learned the meaning of those inexpres- . slble yearnings' of the spirit; those inarticulate responses to beauty that are not of the.eyes and the mind alone. That is why bed-time is the ideal hour I for poetry. Through its magic door we glimpse a lovelier world, and rest more sweetly on tha breast of sleep.