Page:A New Zealand verse (1906).pdf/139
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The Four Queens.
103
CHRISTCHURCH.
And one within a level city lies;To whose tree-shaded streets and squares succeedsA vista of white roads and bordering meads,Until each suburb in the great plain dies.The clustering spires to crown her fair head rise,And for a girdle round her form she leadsThe Avon, green with waving river-weedsAnd swept with swaying willows. And her eyesAre quiet with a student’s reverie;And in the hair that clouds her dreaming faceThere lurks the fragrance of some older place,And memories awake to die again,As, confident and careless, glad and sorrow-freeShe waits, queen of the margeless golden plain.
AUCKLAND.
Set all about with walls, the last fair queenOver a tropic city holds her sway;Her throne on sleeping Eden, whence through grayAnd red-strewn roads and gleaming gardens greenThe city wanders on, and seems to leanTo bathe her beauty in the cool, clear bay,That our past isle and islet winds its wayTo the wide ocean. In her hair a sheenOf sunlight lives; her face is sweetly pale—A queen who seems too young and maidenly,Her beauty all too delicate and frail,To hold a sway imperious. But forthFrom deep, dark eyes, that dreaming seem to be,There shine the strength and passion of the North.