VERSES OLD AND NEW.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1527, 24 August 1912, Page 9

VERSES OLD AND NEW.

TEE AKTIST, He shut his door and mingled with the j throng. A smile, a something vivid, young, half- > wild. A gleam of understanding in his eyes, All-tolerant, all-wise. Drew' a man to him. As they s\rung along, . A woman joined them; last, a child. 'And to nil those that day was passing sweet; . / For now, at last, the man had found a friend. The woman love, the child a fairyland; Each yearning,' dumb demand Of each he heard, and could divinelier meet;. 1 , Than any dream. The day had end. So through tho sunset camo they to his . door . And'he fell silent—smiling still, withal. But looking past, and through them, "Let us come," They cried, "into your home! ■ Friendship—the Future—Love we hold in. store For you, who taught us of them all!" But he, as one who marvelled, said: "What need Havo I of these, who dwell with them' apart?. t Behold now, and farewell They looked and 1 there A room showed, small and bare; Nought could they see within. it V . . save, indeed, 'The tools wherewith he shaped his art. —V. H. Friedlander. • ATHENS. Upon the hills the shepherds feed their flocks. ' . Afar the sea—the violet-tinted seaStill floods in foam around the Pontic rocks, And .with the golden sun holds revelry; Lulling the hyacinths' with drowsy rhyme, About Pentelicus still floats the'bee; AH is as fair as in the olden time, ' All is as-fair as then— But ; where are ye J I iWhero art thou now, 0 Pindar? in what land,; _ ' . Demosthenes, what tongue dost thou now speak?' Far: from'the plane trees by the spring wind fanned, Far from Piraeus where the blue waves break, The plane trees bend them to the winds of spring, And echoes answer to tho breaking sea; Sweet from- the olive groves the wild birds sing Forever of their loveBut where are ye? ' —H de Vere Stacpople. THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. ■D world that holds me by the wings, How shall my soul escape your snares? So dear .are your delightful things, So difficult your toils and cares; That, every way my eoul is held By bonds of love, and bonds of hate; .With all its heavenly ardor quelled, And all its angels desolate . . , Yet in the heart of every child, God and the world are reconciled! , . —Olive Custance. ON THE NEW ROAD. .When you have started forth* towards your ■ vision, When/you have counted up the gain and cost, " When you have faced the old, old world's . derision, Its scoffing tale of all endeavours lost; When all is said, leave it the sane, wise clinging • To proven ways you never can recall; It has not heard your golden trumpet : ringing .' v . • 0 -Pioneer, tho end is worth it ,311. When by your cause you stand, its one defender, _ And heat the jeers and anger grow More . loud, '■ ■ When greater men than you, grtive-evsd arid tender, i Look on your lone defiance from the crowd, •Then,-then the joy. of battle surges in you, The splendour of the quite unequal strife, And all the strength of soul and brain, and sinew . Proclaims that you will win, and this is Life! ,

Madness and pride? Nay, never heed the shouting, ■ . ■ Tho future's : yours—can you not wait, 0 youth? In your divine conceit yon know, tradoubting, That you have found a fragment of God's truth. How shall you fail, how shall your faith diminish ? ' les3 in self than in your splendid dream? • You heard God speak to you, and at the finish Far in the East you, saw your vision gleam. —Mildred Huxley.