SELECTED VERSE

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20911, 16 September 1939, Page 13 (Supplement)

SELECTED VERSE

WHEN THE FOREST SPEAKS At first the forest seems without a tongue, But, as one listens, deep amid the trees One marks the trilling, chirping harmonies Of scattered birds; and then the high notes wrung By insect bands from fiddles tightly strung; Twigs broken; and the lapping melodies Of brooks far-off; and, like vague distant seas, The gradual murmur of the wind among Scarce-rustling foliage. He that bends an ear Follows ail pattering where vine and shoot Make a wall, and tracks the tawny deer Bounding through bracken from a chance pursuit. So much to haunt the sense! such tales to hear! Yet deaf men pass, and say the woods are mute! Stanton A. Coblentz VOICE OF TOMORROW Caught in a net of liquid light The voice of water rises now, Under the canopy of night. Water becomes a tree, a flower, A dream of colour for the passing hour. Up from the earth the water flows, Cascading into blue and green, Dissolving in a mist of rose. In this bright city where the heart can find Some answer for the questing mind. The fountain lifts her plumes of fire, Obedient to men’s desire. But men can never chain the sound That echoes in the moving air, Where the tall fountain leaves its stain . . Above the city’s changing word Thy voice of water now is heard. Sara Van Alstyne Allen

MEDITATION The worshippers had gone, and through the open door I glimpsed an altar on which candles burned, Cool and withdrawm, far from the traffic's roar. At first I envied those who could be sure Of finding God within that holy place. Then I remembered that I just nad seen The flaming sunrise from a lofty hill; Last evening when the weary world was still Rapt I had viewed the sunset’s fiery glow And, gazing on the darkening heavens afar, Had seen a radiant angel stoop to light The shining candle of the evening star. Then quiet filled my soul, and deep content. Since the whole world is Goa's bright tenement. I need no altar and no sacred shrine. /. 11 ground is hallowed, every spot divine. —Una W. Harsen, in the Christian Century WHITE SWANS (Alkmaar, Holland.) So soundlessly, so gracefully, thev float Upon the dark unmoving mirror of the still canal, They might be creatures in a dream, aloof, remote; More painted birds than actual. The hour of evening falls; bells chime. And on the bridges homeward footsteps pass, Unheeded by white swans in their sublime Detachment, floating on black glass. Asleep, their images are sharp in starlight; Birds and reflections alike are perfect things. Part of this very peace of night. Quiet heads secure beneath white wings. —Frederick Ebright.