"Why should not wattle do
For mistletoe?"
Asked one — they were but two —
Where wattles grow.
He was her lover, too,
Who urged her so —
"Why should not wattle do
For mistletoe?"
A rose-cheek rosier grew;
Rose-lips breathed low;
"Since it is here, and YOU,
I hardly know
Why wattle should not do."
Victor James Daley.
Players
And after all — and after all,
Our passionate prayers, and sighs, and tears,
Is life a reckless carnival?
And are they lost, our golden years?
Ah, no; ah, no; for, long ago,
Ere time could sear, or care could fret,
There was a youth called Romeo,
There was a maid named Juliet.
The players of the past are gone;
The races rise; the races pass;
And softly over all is drawn
The quiet Curtain of the Grass.
But when the world went wild with Spring,
What days we had! Do you forget?
When I of all the world was King,
And you were my Queen Juliet?
The things that are; the things that seem —
Who shall distinguish shape from show?
The great processional, splendid dream
Of life is all I wish to know.