THE MOUNTAIN LAD.

New Zealand Tablet, 16 October 1919, Page 9

THE MOUNTAIN LAD.

Ho dreamt of a gray hillside homo Soft-colored like the crumbled loam In tilted fields he used to plough And memories sweet as honeycomb Came back at curious moments, 'then : The Indian-pipes in Mary’s glen When mountain-Juno returns again Moccasin-flowers, rose and ten, That down the Clove at sunrise ran Arbutus-coral on tho ledge, The harebell at the cliff’s clean edge, And mosses marching through the wood Dusk-footed like a partridge-brood, All the still things ho used to know, The silence of midsummer trees, Tho noiseless footsteps of first snow, Ho liked to think of these. The guns roared on, but he was back In the blueberry pasture; black With sun and sweetness and not blue Tho fruit ho gathers! Though ho lacked The words to say as much to you. Tho lad was fighting for a dream With high hills in it, and a stream Reflecting silver poplar-trees And willows: but far more than these He wanted earth hushed a little while Till mothers learned again to smile And fathers found new tales to tell At twilight as when all was well! Lovers no duty kept apart, And laughter from a people’s heart, Untroubled bells along the wind, And highways safe and the sea kind, These are the thoughts that helped him tight, These, for his own and every land! And he was ready day or night For these to make his stand. Grace Hazard Co'nklinc, in the N.Y. Touchstone. a. M i.