Page:A New Zealand verse (1906).pdf/226
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190
Art and Beauty.
And we came out of Fairyland,
As many have come before;
And the heather-bells and sunbeams sang
Their songs to us no more.
As many have come before;
And the heather-bells and sunbeams sang
Their songs to us no more.
But as we left sweet Fairyland
We heard an old man say,
“Though fools may enter Fairyland,
Only the wise may stay.”
We heard an old man say,
“Though fools may enter Fairyland,
Only the wise may stay.”
CXXVII.
Art and Beauty.
I saw as in a dream a palace high,
With deep-domed roof on massive columns set,
Wherein were forms, the loveliest Art had yet
Conceived, which none could over-magnify.
The dome was as a star-bespangled sky,
The columns richly chased; and there was met
In every niche a lovely statuette,
And all around Art’s glories charmed the eye;
And while I gazed, and thought that here I saw
Man’s fairest dreams preserved beyond decay
The palace fell; and I was filled with awe.
Then lo! there broke the splendours of the day,
And all things seemed to say in earth and sky,
“Though Art be mortal, Beauty cannot die.”
With deep-domed roof on massive columns set,
Wherein were forms, the loveliest Art had yet
Conceived, which none could over-magnify.
The dome was as a star-bespangled sky,
The columns richly chased; and there was met
In every niche a lovely statuette,
And all around Art’s glories charmed the eye;
And while I gazed, and thought that here I saw
Man’s fairest dreams preserved beyond decay
The palace fell; and I was filled with awe.
Then lo! there broke the splendours of the day,
And all things seemed to say in earth and sky,
“Though Art be mortal, Beauty cannot die.”
Henry Allison