SAINT JULIET.

New Zealand Tablet, 25 August 1921, Page 37

SAINT JULIET.

I am Saint Juliet, and I pray You all some soft petition say— All maids who love, all wives who bear Beneath their glossy coils of hair Dreams of the child that shall be born Some windy eve or stormy morn With bitter tears and crying strong, To lift the worn world's cross along.

I am Saint Juliet, and I was A maid that danced on orchard grass, That plucked of full delight the flower When Tarsus was a place of power. My shoe-strings were of twisted gold, And wolf-skins kept me from the cold; About my throat great pearls I wound The world so sweet a world I found That everywhere was holy ground.

I am Saint Juliet. Clad in green And gold, I went one festal e'en, And raised my eyes, and saw my love, And all the bliss and pain thereof. My lover took me by the' hands: He was a soldier without lands. He had no gold, he had no gear, But he was beautiful and dear.' I laid my love beneath his feet, J hat he might take or trample it.

My lover's God for mine I took; I made his soul my missal-book. He wedded me, and then we fled: Our heads were priced and coveted. Wo loved each other half a year With love that did abolish fear, Although men from our hiding-place Drew us and forced us to retrace ' Our steps to Tarsus as to death: So well we loved who died for faith

Given to lions my lover died I might not perish by his side; But, when my little son was born, 1 hey brought me out one golden morn (My twenty years had been so sweet!) hey bowed my head; they lagged my feetBut my beloved leaned (I knew? ' I<rom heaven to see his wife keep true. And so I went out like a bride, With guards before and guards beside. A yellow veil upon my hair I wore, as brides are wont to wear.

I had not thought that they would make My babe a, martyr for Christ's sake But him upon my breast they slew &re my first dying breath I drew ' 1 think I did not greatly fear the beasts, my lover was so nearNo near the God he perished for; But when I saw the Opening door Of Heaven, v ] OO J so grand-a place lhat, as I died, I hid my face

Oh, it is all so long ago, I have forgotten every throe That shook my body; for I am Safe with the father of my lamb. Only when mothers pray to me, My days on earth I seem to see; • And one old sorrow hastens back, The death of little Cyriac, My baby. There you' who know The two best things that women know The glory of your lover's kiss, ' The joyous pain that bearing is, Pray God to keep us in His rest, Till every heart beats in His breast. Norah Chesson, in the Dublin Review