Select Poetry.
THE CROOKED FOOTPATH. '
Ah, here it is! the sliding rail r That marks the old remembered spot, The gap that struck onr schoolboy trails The crooked path across the lot. ;
It left the road by school and church, A pencilled shadow, nothing more, That parted from the silver birch, _ And ended at the farm-house door.
No line or compass traced its plan; With frequent bends to left and right, In aimless wayward curves it ran, But always kept the door in sight. .., ..,
The gabled porch with woodbine green, The broken millstone at the sill, — Though many a rood might stretch between, The truant child could see them still.
No rocks across the path-way lie. No fallen trunk is o'er it thrown, And yet it winds, we know not why, And turns as if from tree or stone.
Perhaps some lover trod the way With shaking knees and leaping heart, And so it often runs astray With sinuous sweep or sudden start.
Or one, perchance,, with clouded brain, From some unholy banquet reeled, And still, our devious steps maintain This track across the trodden field.
Nay, deem not thus>—no earthborn will Could ever trace a faultless line; ' Our truest steps aro human still,— To walk unswerving were divine!
Truants from love, we dream of wrath; Oh, rather, let us trust the more! Through all the wanderings of the path, We still can see our Father's door! Oliver Wendeil Holmbj.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/THS18830519.2.2
Bibliographic details
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Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4484, 19 May 1883, Page 1
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240Select Poetry. Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4484, 19 May 1883, Page 1
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