By the white Church of the Kings,
By the proud red towers,
Thronging round about me came
Ghosts of long-dead hours;
Ghosts of many a blazing June,
Many a keen December—
“Thus and thus and thus we did.
Do you not remember?”
REMINDER
It’s I was sad at parting, but the red heart from my breast
I left you as a token that I would not feast or rest
Without a thought of you to kiss my lips before the wine,
Without a dream of you to stoop and make my sleep divine.
So lest you should forget one word of all the words we said,
My heart, my only jewel, fired with living, pulsing red,
A trinket at your girdle hangs, and as a sign to me
The hungry, aching blank is, where my glad heart used to be.
CULGAI PADDOCK
I know that the tawny grass of the plain
Is blown like the sea to-day
By the wind that follows the autumn rain
And chases the clouds away,
And ruffles the winding lagoon, and now
The sky’s blue, dewy and clean,
Will show in the lee where the rushes bow
Like shattered aquamarine.
To-day, when the cranes in their grey and pink
Fish solemnly in the weeds,
To-day, when the cattle come down to drink
And push through the whispering reeds,
I stand there and watch them, in Culgai too,
And they do not heed or fear;
There is not one lark in the radiant blue
Whose carol I do not hear.
This morning the wind on the grasses brown
Blows tingling and sweet and rare;
Now though my body must tarry in town
Thank God that my soul is there!