SELECTED VERSE.

Waikato Times, Volume 100, Issue 16712, 30 January 1926, Page 11 (Supplement)

SELECTED VERSE.

DEATH. We are too stupid about death. We will not learn How it is wages paid to those who earn, How it is the gift, for which on earth we yearn, To be set free from bondage to the flesh; How it is turning seed com into grain, How it is winning Heaven's eternal gain, How it means freedom, ever more from pain, How it untangles every mortal mesh.

We are so selfish about death. We count our grief Far more than we consider their relief Whom the Great Reaper gathers in the sheaf, No more to know the seasons' constant change; And we forget that it means only life, Life with all joy, peace, rest and glory rife, The victory won, and ended all the strife, And Heaven no v longer; far away or strange.

Their Lent is over and their Easter

won, Waiting till over Paradise the sun Shall rise in majesty, and life begun Shall grow in glory, as the perfect day Moves on, to hold its endless, deathless sway. PRIMITIVE MAN. (Lucretius V., 925-941. The men that lived unhous'd in those far days Were hardier, as beseemed an earthborn race. Their bones were big and solid, and their thews Knit in a sturdy frame. Nor heat nor cold Could quickly weaken them, nor roughest fare, Nor bodily disease; but like the beasts They lived and roamed at large, and many suns Passed over them. They had no skill, though strong, To guide the plough, no use of iron tools To work the land: saplings they planted none, Nor used the hook to lop the antlered boughs From lofty trees. What sun and rain might give, And what the earth brought forth uctill'd, were gifts To satisfy their hearts. And thus they lived, On acorns maybe, or on wilding fruits: Those red-ripe berries of the winter time Were more abundant then and larger too; Their world was young and fertile, and brought forth Enough hard fare to rear a suffering race. —Denis Turner. p. . _— STRENGTH. What lies I read, that men of strength Have keen and penetrating looks That, flashing here and flashing there, Command success—what foolish books! '

For when we go to life we find That men and dogs that fight till death Are sleepy-eyed and.look so calm We wonder if they live by breath 1

Love, too, must hold her saucy tongue, And turn on us two sleepy eyes, And full, like books, of pretty lies. To prove she is no painted doll. II. Davies. SILENCE. Earth is but the frozen echo of the silent voice of God. Like a dewdrop in a crystal throbbing in the senseless clod; Silence is the heart of all things, sound the fluttering of its pulse, Which the fever and the spasm of the universe convulse. "THE MORAL OF ALL TALES." This is the moral of all human tales; 'Tis but the same rehearsal of the past— First freedom and then glory; when that fails, Wealth, vice t corruption, barbarism at last: And History, with all its volumes vast, Hath but one page. « BETHLEHEM." The long years go; the old stars rise and set; Dreams perish and we falter in the night, i But still there's Bethlehem; could heart forget That lovelieness, that Light—: Shadows there are, but who shall fail for them? Still there is Bethlehem. RIVALS. Of all the torments, all the cares, With which our lives are curst; Of all the plagues a lover bears, Sure rivals are the worst! By partners in each other kind Afflictions easier grow; In love alone wc hate to find Companions of our woe. / Sylvia, for all the pangs yu see Are labouring in my breast, I beg not you would favour me, Woulc) you but slight the rest! , How great soe'er your rigours are, With them alone I'll cope; I can endure my own despair, But not another's hope. —William Walsh (IGG3-*708). THE ACORN. The acorn is a common thing and small, Child of Iho sun and plaything o: the wind, You think it is of no account at all, Yet at its heart great forces crash and grind. The acorn is a holy things and dear, The green leaves shudder out to meet the light, The great tree rushes upward, tier on tier, Stretching wild boughs towards the infinite. -A-Eva Gore-Booth.