light of song were but night.
If I could not at will a winged dream let
Lift me and take me and set
Me again by the trees and the streamlet;
These leagues make a wide water, yet
The whole world shall not hide.

Now my days leave the soft silent byway,
And clothed in a various sort,
In iron or gold, on life's highway
New feet shall succeed, or stop short
Shod hard these maybe, or made splendid,
Fair and many, or evil and few,
But the going of bare feet has ended,
Of naked feet set in the new
Meadow grass sweet and wet.

I will long for the ways of soft walking,
Grown tired of the dust and the glare,
And mute in the midst of much talking
Will pine for the silences rare;
Streets of peril and speech full of malice
Will recall me the pastures and peace
Which gardened and guarded those valleys
With grasses as high as the knees,
Calm as high as the sky:

While the island secure in my spirit
At ease on its own ocean rides,
And Memory, a ship sailing near it,
Shall float in with favouring tides,
Shall enter the harbours and land me
To visit the gorges and heights
Whose aspects seemed once to command me,
As queens by their charms command knights
To achievements of arms.

And as knights have caught sight of queens' faces
Through the dust of the lists and the din,
So, remembering these holiest places
In the days when I lose or I win,
I will yearn to them, all being over,
Triumphant or trampled beneath,
To this beautiful isle like a lover,
To her evergreen brakes for a wreath,
For a tear to her lakes.

The last of her now is a brightening
Far fire in the forested hills,
The breeze as the night nears is heightening,
The cordage draws tighter and thrills,
Like a horse that is spurred by the rider
The great vessel quivers and quails,
And passes the billows beside her,
The fair wind is strong in her sails,
She is lifted along.

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's Station Life in New Zealand, by Lady Barker

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STATION LIFE IN NEW ZEALAND **