Selected Poetry.

Western Star, Issue 1339, 23 March 1889, Page 2 (Supplement)

Selected Poetry.

BEATJLIEU. By the Boyne Water rolling to the sea, And near its mouth, an ancient churchyard heaves , Green mounds, called Beauheu. well named Beauh'eu, for No fairer spot thro' all the land is seen. And close beside the church and churchyard, stands— , . 'Mid tali ancestral trees, and gardens fair, And terraced walks and lovely vistas bound By river or by hill—a goodly house, Meet for the situation. Bf ctory ? Mayhap— I know not; for, a stranger, I Upon its privacy could not intrude With questions, tho' by curiosity Not instigated, but the absolute need Of information; to me but was given To look, to speculate, to long to know All could be known; ye! much I doubt it aught There be to tell beyond what I have seen Carven upon a stone—a stone that stood Leaning against the church wall; ivy hung Around and shaded it, and almost md It from my sight—in all my wanderings The very strangest thing that I had seen. A stone it is some four feet high—or more Or less a little—and upon it rests A coffin, doubtless, tho' not a coffin-shaped. More like it was to half an erg-shell, through Its length divided, and of the inside Scooped clean. Outside it—tied at head and foot Beyond its bounds—a shroud, that, opening wide From end to end, displayed the coffin—or Whate'er you name it—with its grim contents — A skeleton—!—that lies there; skeleton In limbs alone. The face is still a face ; The throat a throat, though it divided down Displays the windpipe rising, ring on ring. The shoulders still are shoulders, and the chest A cheßt, but all is open space beneath The ribs ; therein the heart, at which a rat Insatiable, gnaws ever. By the heart— Poor heart! a something hangs, not touching it But separate; 'tis as a finger, long A finger, broad, and, like a finger, round ; But what its meaning, I've no still to tell. The rest is bones—and round the bony legs, The bony arms, and hands, and feet, the worms— Great worms and small—are crawling; round and round They twist and twine; aDd one into each ear Creeps lithely; whispering, are they ? of th pride, The state, and stateliness, reduced to this I Outside both shell and shroud a lizard clings, His head and eyes already raised above J he edge, he seems to contemplate the wreck Within. So we, too,|who stand as yet Without the coffin for our bones that waits As surely, somewhere and somewhen —let us, Too, looking, contemplate the end of pride, And putting it aside, ere comes the end, Walk as beseems us, humbly with our God. C.Jobltng.