SELECTED VERSE

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20923, 30 September 1939, Page 15 (Supplement)

SELECTED VERSE

AMERICA AND ENGLAND England, we stand with thee— Today, and, God grant, for a thousand years— Leagued in a brotherhood of kindred aims. Our common law, our hard-won liberty, Our speech, our sturdy faith were born of thee; Milton still speaks our very consciencerights; Cromwell is captain of our onward march; Shakespeare the myriad-mind of our great world. England, we stand with thee— Thy kith and kin in spirit and in blood— United in a hundred years of peace, United, heart to heart and hand to hand. No ancient grudges shall inflame our soul, We love the same fair play, the honest game, We love the sacred faith of plighted word, And seek to serve the cause of human kind. —Dr. Oliver Huckel WIND IN THE GRASS Upon a neighboring hill there lies a field Of ripening grass, as yet untouched by scythe’s Keen blade, a sloping bend of green, with here And there a patch that even now has bleached to gold. Fitful breeze sweeps down that stretch And ripples the grass with a loving touch Until the last wave laps the. woodland’s edge As the sea, when its arching breakers have Fallen, curls, and rolls up the sandy beach. George B. C. Rugg THE BROTHERHOOD OF MAN O weary World! tempestuously beset: Greed, Envy, Hate, all clamouring to thee Of wrongs and rights on this land and that And, massacring their hundred thousands, yet Self-praised . . . for Moloch never can regret, While Mammon glorifies his infamy; And Commerce may enjoy a jubilee If sheltered by some chosen parapet.

SEA EDGE We left the spruces and at last we found The sea, a silver music far below, And one gull flying, black upon the ground Its shadow fled that in the air was low And white and plumy, so we heard at last The ebbing tide turn inward and the long long Threads of its sandals in the music cast Against the ear, soft as a small shell’s song. So by the tide’s edge did we learn to snare Those tiny pools of colour ere the sea Creep up to meet them dim and sleeping there. We listened, waited and you said to me; This is a music half of air and light Caught between daylight and the velvet night. Harold Vinal RAIN CAME DOWN Out of the air, the summer air, The quick bright rain came down. The low clouds spread a roof across The rooftops of the town. Rain came down on a boy at play, Down on his tousled hair, He turned his face up, raised his hands, His laughter shook the air. Rain came down on the city street. Down on a man that day. He ran to a doorway, frowning, And wished the rain away. Out of the sky, the summer sky The rain came, quick and bright. For one it was summer’s loveliness. For one it was summer’s blight. —Robert Wistrand. CAMEO Chiseled in relief to-day, Shadows cut by August sun, Elm and maple leaves are traced On the grass like antique lace; Feathered tufts of garden blooms Flank the flagstone’s mottled walk, Barricade about the door Sharp the rose tree’s tangled stalk. Keen the loveliness to-day, Memory, store this gem away! —Ruth W. Hey wood.