Verse--Old & New

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18255, 25 November 1933, Page 13

Verse--Old & New

On a Perthshire Hilltop. Piets dug their earthworks on this airy crest; II held a Roman outpost in its day, Where now in sunny solitude'l rest i And see what they saw, centuries j away. Time’s toys are dwarfed to naught, so far below; : The t rain, white-maned, that threads the valley there; The village houses in their rigid row; The black, ruled roads, the eugmed ants they bear. The Piet, the Roman, sitting where i sit I. j Watching blue shadows drift from hill to hill, Breathed from his soul the praise of stin and sky ; And of the peace that reigns un- ! broken still. They knew the thyme’s pure scent; like me they saw The jewelled insect thrusting through the grass; Are we not kin by wonder and by awe And bv delight in things that do not pass.' —W.K.H., in the Glasgow Herald. The Old House. Deserted, lonely by the road it; stands, A. wee-bit- house, time-scarred and worn and grey, So like a little empty nest dropped down Some time by laughing winds and boisterous play. The sagging blinds swing idly in the wind, The doorstep that once thrilled at the touch Of hurrying feet is covered thick with dust; Such is the price we pay. Life asks j so much. 1 wonder sometimes if old houses long To hear a sudden slamming of a 'door, Of voices calling out from room to room, The rush of hurrying feet across a floor? Forsaken, lonely, by the road it stands, Unheeded by the life that passes Ivy; I turn to go, and wonder if that sound Was just the wind, or do old houses cry? i —Florence Jones Hadley, i in the New Outlook. Apples, Sweet Apples. “Apples, sweet apples, all russet brown, Fresh from Somerset, brought to town! ” This cry t heard in the market-square This morning as I went, shopping there. Oh, laughing rogue of a market lad, .IT you only knew what wares you had. You’d never ask but a few pence a pound For those russet jewels so ripe ami round! AJI the rnagie is there of a country fair For a few pence a pound in the market square! Somerset, apples from Somerset trees, Ripened by Somerset suns and breeze, Gathered by maidens ‘how comely and fair With such bright blue eyes and such nut-brown hair! Oil, laughing rogue of a market lad, I.f you only knew what wares you had — The magic laid bare of a county fair For a Jew pence a pound in the mar-ket-square! Eva Fitzmaurice, in Scottish Country Life.