Page:A New Zealand verse (1906).pdf/147

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The White Convolvulus.
111
Ranges on ranges, far crest on crest,The long Alp-barriers closed the West,Like the walls of the Median city old,A guardian girdle sevenfold.
There grimmest ridges looked softer throughThe clinging film of their gentle blue,Where high in the haze of the summits showThe cool, faint streaks of belated snow.
And all, from the mountain, the great plain o’er,To the sickle-blade of the curving shore,From earth below to the heaven’s height,Was pierced and filled with the living light.
Many and many a flower-maid,For her tender beauty half afraid,Loosed for the Lord of the Day her zone,Seen by the wandering wind alone.
The fragile lilac, alas! was fledWith the delicate breath of the springtide dead,Swift as a vision of vanished youth,Briefest and fleetest, a dream of ruth.
But the ruddy may in the hedges grew,The satin wings of the white flag flew,And the dandelion's orange clotsWere stars in a thousand wastrel plots.
The rose’s poetry, poppy’s prose,The braggart peony’s wrathful rowsBy the dainty pink and the pansy stood,Where iris flaunted her purple hood.
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