MELODY.

Otago Witness, Issue 2923, 23 March 1910, Page 70

MELODY.

Choose thy harp and come to me, Airy, moving Melody. From the high celestial light O'er the bosom of the night, Or in dulcet measures borne, On the echo'd tongue of morn. And, thou spirit, sigh again In thy low iEolian strain; Or when tired mortals dream Move thy music on the stream, Till its genii shall play Raptur'd thro' the sleeping day— And the thrush's throbbing thr.c-afc Peeling forth thy sweetest note, Or the scrag of sobbing trees Swaying slowly in the breeze, Or the ocean's distant roar, Ot its white'surf on the shore. Come, sweet spirit, thus to me, Fetch thy closest harmony, As thy fairies trip along. Dancing lightly through thy song, Till the ghoul of care has fled To his tomb-encompass'd bed, In some gloomy Stygian den Paved with the hones of men. Or, thou spirit, if I ask What thou deem'st a burden'd task, Then, in rapture less,, I'd take Music such as mortals make: Mekdy, tho' less than ttdne^ Yet" a music still divine, Cleaned from th' unseen above And tli' inscir'd breast of love; And from thee again I'd cheese All the musio of the mu*e Such as shook the semis, of men Down through Shakespeare's golden pen, Tipp'd great Hoinsr's tpns-ue with fire, Tun'd majestic Milton's lyre,— Pulses through the rat>tur r d heart With our Bu'rns's breathing art; Till, with »H thy s.T>ir-'t« at nlt-y. Mirth should come and peace should stay, J.oy might deign to walk with me, Fairy-fingered Melody. —Phcsnix.