Verse Old and New.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 18, 3 May 1911, Page 71

Verse Old and New.

The OH Cellar Flaee. F HUGE depression in the earth f I o’ergrown I With grass and weeds, • where rose and lilac sprout In wild disorder straggle all about And in the midst a tumbled heap of stone Sprawled like a ruined tomb, deserted, lone, And smoke-begrimed, where ghosts of ancient fires, Tn generations past lit by the sires, Flicker a brief moment and then are gone! Here hid the apples from the light of day And mellowed in the darkness; saek and bin Held ample store against the winter's frost; But now the house has perished with decay Since they are gone who made the home within; And all but this old cellar place is lost. —Frederick E. Snow. <S> In After Days. In after days when grasses high O’ertop the stone where I shall lie, Though ill or well the world adjust My slender claim to honoured dust, I shall not question or reply, . I shall not see the morning sky: I shall not hear the night-wind sigh; I shall lie mute, as all men must In after days! But yet, now living, fain were I That some one then should testify, Saying—"He held his pen in trust _,To Art. not serving shame or lust.’’ Will none?—Then let my memory die . ; In after days! " ...... —Austin Dobson.

Pictures ef L«ve. My Bella is a charming maid, One of the fairest of earth's creatures, Brown eyes, brown hair, a trifle staid, Well off. and with attractive features; She is a thing without a taint; The one fly in my pot of honey Is that she thinks that she can paint; It's very funny.

Truth is an attribute I prize: But in the processes of wooing. When she displays to my shocked eyes Some dreadful daub that she was doing, I praised it warmly on the spot; I called it great —but meant to flatter; It was a lie, but I did not Think it would matter. Nor did it then. But ever since We told our love (with some emotion) Fate has inspired her to evince The breadth and depth of her devotion With gifts—not goods of silver, gold, And such—not even an umbrella— But pictures, awful to behold; O, Arabella! I have a "Spring” which makes one creep. “Autumn” (the trees alone are muddy), Some things which I believe are sheep, And something which she calls a "Study,” "Dawn on the Sands.” in fleshly pink, A pair of blue seas and a green one, And a weird cow, which makes you think She's never seen one. My humble walls were once bedight With works of some artistic- merit; Some bought, because they pleased the sight; Some. 1 was lucky to inherit; Those well-loved friends have vanished now:

Others, with strange and startling faces,"— Headed by that infernal cow. Usurp their places. It may be, as my friends declare, I err in being too fastidious. But can the eye that holds her fair See that her work is aught but hide- , , OUS? And. tho‘ I try to bear in mind The thought that love is blind, of should be, I am not blind—l can’t be blind—--1 wish I could be.’ And yet. when Bella roams unchecked About the room where hang those pictures. — • And stands, admiring the effect, I clean forget my private strictures; The simple fact that she is nigh Seems to improve their aspect vastly; It's when the artist isn't by That they're so ghastly. & ■s> An Englishman's Home. [The women of Switzerland are petitioning the Government not to grant any more half-holidays, because, when their husbands come home early, they do not know what to do with themselves, and are a nuisance in the house.] When they closed the office early, honouring the King or Queen, I would fly to Little Girlie and my cot at Golder’s Green; Swiftly? Lightning wasn't in it! Newly wedded, would I miss E'en the fraction of a minute of my sweet domestic bliss ?

Gladly Girlie used to greet me, with a hammer in her hand: “Edwin, dear, the pictures beat me! On the steps I cannot stand. Twice the naughty hammer lighted on your Girlie's little thumb; Edwin. I am so excited that my ownest own has come.”

Then we sought our occupations. On a chair.my Girlie sat And directed operations—kept me doing ■. this and that;

And she paaaed severest strictures or my hand aAd on n*y ey«r As 1 hung askew the pictures, aa I mad* the plaster fly. When the feast of good St. Michael warned that summer joys must cease. * She would bid me clean her cycle, coat ing it with wintry grease; *. And I toiled for hours together, vaselining spokes and rims. With a rag and chamois leather, till ( ached in all my limbs. When there came upon the tapis first a lass and then a lad, Girlie used to make them happy at the thought of tea with Dad; Anil as I was fingered jammily by adhesive little cubs-"* Girlie used to leave her family for an evening at her clubs. When they close the office early, honouring the King or Queen. Do I fly to Little Girlie and my cot at Golder's Green, Or when in their eager numbers all my fellow-clerks have fled. Do I prosecute my slumbers in my office ehair instead? •$> «>.<s> -J A Poet. > Into a tissue of remembered things. He weaves the moonbeams and 'the threads of mist, And colours it .with sweet imaginings. Cloudy embroideries, by sunset kissed. He sees among the dewdrops dji the ferns - The fleeting prototype of children's tears, -I And in the music of the burns The pent-up laughter of a thousand Along the dear, familiar paths he* knows, The sight that marks the crossing of the way.' is? -- • '* The dreams that liapnt the petals of the rose. ? 5 > • And all the• w’onders-of a quiet'day; So glide away the yearswith niinstrel>iy— -jr - .... - , . ■ The magic of his_ boundless fantasy,

-Eleanor Ester.