SELECTED VERSE.

Waikato Times, Volume 93, Issue 14540, 11 December 1920, Page 9 (Supplement)

SELECTED VERSE.

ENTHRALLED. (By D. M. Ross). Oft have I watched the weird Aurora spread A Tyrian panoply above the Pole, And wondered to Hie sea’s tremendous roll, How come the Dead if re-incarnated. Do all, at length, who from our vision fled. Find, under Death’s magnanimous control, A natural means to manifest the soul Portraying us our dear Immortal Dead I

They say the Sovran dreamers of the Earth Sec magi and a Christ in every stall, The Eternal Father in the Son reborn; I only know my Love’s eventful birth Is bound in my emotions like a thrall, A happy ghost no grave can make forlorn. SUNSET. The brightness of Hie evening sky Across the moor is falling, The sunset glory draweth nigh, With charmed peace enthralling. And in Hie glen, with soothing power, And with a strange appealing, God leads Hie soul at twilight hour Into His land of healing. The weary toiler at the gates Through which the river flowed., With patient heart expectant waits, And, as the sunset gloweth, Feels the soft touch of Nature’s hand The mists of earth dispelling, And hears beyond the sunlit land The heavenly chorus swelling.

Fair sunset strikes her harp of gold That in the far west swingeth, And wakes the tender song of old That down the valley ringeth; And through those crimson skies with grace, ’Mid angel hosts adoring, Peace, with the smiling, lovelit face, Above the earin is soaring. •—Gilbert Rae. THE ROSE OF YOUTH. Keep the rose of youth in your heart When your own sweet youth is past; ’Twill fling a fragrance around you As long as your life will last . Give it the breeze of your laughter, The dew of your healing tears; Let Hie sun of love shine on it Thro 1 the burden of the years. Keep the rose of youth in your heart — The rose that has ne’er a thorn — And rest will be yours at night, And joy will be yours at morn. ■—M. Hedderwick Browne. CHARMS. Simple the charms that with wonderful power Stir Hie deep waters of memory’s well; Fragments of song or the scent of a flower — Potent are these like some magical spell. Back we are borne on the waves ol remembrance, Scenes long forgotten grow clear to the view; Marvellous power hath some subtle fragrance To conjure up round us Hie friends whom we knew. Faded old letters, grown yellow with keeping, Speak as it were with the voice ol the dead, Charm us to laughter, or low, bitter weeping— Echoes are they from the years that are fled; Ghosts from a time that is gone past recalling, Visions and spectres that rise as we gaze; Dim apparitions, with aspect appalling, Point, to the folly of those vanished days. Letters may burn, we may keep not a token, Naught to remind us of years long gone by; Music will haunt though the last link be broken, The scent of a (lower bring tears to the eye. —Frances A. Manks.