Page:A New Zealand verse (1906).pdf/149
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The White Convolvulus.
113
“I am a daughter of air and light,
Of bird and willow the playmate white,
Fed on the fire of our god the sun,
Not by desire of a mortal won.
Of bird and willow the playmate white,
Fed on the fire of our god the sun,
Not by desire of a mortal won.
“Withering, dying at mortal touch,
I fade away in the spoiler’s clutch,
Never in prison to droop my span,
In the heavy air of the house of man.
I fade away in the spoiler’s clutch,
Never in prison to droop my span,
In the heavy air of the house of man.
“But here I nod to the drowsy wind,
In a tremulous hammock of tendrils twined,
Eyeing my friends on their journey by,
The honey-sucker and dragon-fly.
In a tremulous hammock of tendrils twined,
Eyeing my friends on their journey by,
The honey-sucker and dragon-fly.
“Watching them ruffle the glassy floor
Of the long, green, arching corridor,
Whose whispering willows dip and rise,
Cutting the stream as the current flies.
Of the long, green, arching corridor,
Whose whispering willows dip and rise,
Cutting the stream as the current flies.
“In the dim sweet water-world are seen
Mazes of streaming and shifting green,
And deeper, dreaming beyond, a few
Silvery clouds in the bowl of blue.
Mazes of streaming and shifting green,
And deeper, dreaming beyond, a few
Silvery clouds in the bowl of blue.
“And there I gaze at the spectral sky,
The ghost of the rocking sphere on high,
Till touched by twilight my flower is furled,
And my shadow steals from the water-world.
The ghost of the rocking sphere on high,
Till touched by twilight my flower is furled,
And my shadow steals from the water-world.
“I must be free as the wildest thing,
In the leafy tangle to curl and cling,
Free to laugh in the beams of day,
Free on the blast to be borne away.
In the leafy tangle to curl and cling,
Free to laugh in the beams of day,
Free on the blast to be borne away.