VERSE, OLD AND NEW.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LII, Issue 1701, 17 April 1926, Page 10

VERSE, OLD AND NEW.

THEY SHALL' NOT 'PASS. A little war episode: When in response to an appeal not to let the foe break tho Jibe, the men declared: They shall not pass. With sounding noise of battle, See, yonder comes the foe, A thousand cannons rattle, . A thousand men fall low. See, men, our foes advancing ■'Would, take our own" fair land, Would drink her wine (all foaming), With shout of ribald baud. Would raze her fairest cities, Would steal her maidens fair, Would show no love nor pity On all whom they found there. See, swift the hosts advancing, '.We must not let them in; Must keep the lino unbroken, Our line of blue so thin. With one wild shout they answered, We'll hold it to the last, Ami, until death overtakes us, We will not let them pass. The alien hosts swept closer,,, The line of blue grew dim; For each who dropped from motion Another man stepped in. . With sobbing breath I hey struggled, While death came thick and fast Yet. through the din and muddle. The focniaik could not pass.. They fell in heaps, and singly, . Each to his post held fast, Their bipod with foeman mingling,. But did not let them pass. L. Miunis. WAITING; ' Serene, 1 fold my hands and wait Nor care for-wind or lido or sea; I. rave no more 'gainst- time or fate, For lo! my own shall come to me. I stay my haste,; I make delays, For what avails this eager pace? I stand amid the eternal ways, And what is mine shall know ray face. Asleep, awake, by night or tiny, '-The friends I seek are seeking me; No wind can drive my barque astray, Nor chnnge the tide of destiny. —Burroughs. CHANCE AND CHANGE. To the chance reading of a book, Or flash of some remembered scene Some silent sufferer's upward look, Or thought of things that might have- been — To this or that, in after days, Wo- trace the parting of the ways. Yet ne'er was Fate, or wandering Chance Sole lord of that uplifting hour; The passing touch of circumstance But loosed some hidden spring of power; And whatsoever foes we front, That inward power must bear the brunt. —Thomas Thorncly. . THE TREE LOVER.' Wlio loves a tree he loves the life that springs in star and'clod; He loves the love that gilds the clouds and greens the April sod; He loves the Wide Beneficence. His soul takes hold on God. A tree is one of nature's words, a word of peace to man. A word that tells of central strength from whence all things began. A word to preach tranquility to all our restless Clan. 'Tis well the current of his life should toward the deeps be whirled, And feel the clash of alien waves along its channels whirled, And the conflux of the eddies of the mighty-flowing world. But lie is'wise who, 'mid what noise. his winding way may be, Still keeps a heart that holds a nook of calm serenity, ' And an inviolate virgin soul that still can love a tree. —Samuel Walter Foss. *" NEW CLEARING. Where lonely hawk Kept eye on grass, Barn swallows now Pass and re-pass, / And lantern flame Puts out fhe'light That pale day left To watch.with night. The brier is bent By more than deer " For children's hands Have hunted here, And children':* calls Sound from the wood Where, until late, Lived solitude. • The wild has flown On silent wings, A hearth-firo burns, A woman sings, A man breaks ground, A secret grows From barren rock To budding rose. And would the moon Desire again .' The peacefulness That fled from'men, Let him not mourn,