Poem by Rupert Atkinson

Evensong

WHAT dream in what strange land
Shall waken me to-night? What sweet
Lips burn for mine? What arms entwine
My neck, my knees, my feet —
Beneath white columns graven.
Above an azure haven;
Within vast castles paven

With the gold of Fairyland?
Where captive damsels hear my fleet
Steps rescuing them — their lips I meet.
O, life is grand! O, night is sweet
In that voluptuous land !

Prone from a dizzy shore,

Calm oceans, cool with wind and wave.
Oblivious reach past isle and beach.

Glad from my very grave —
From rose-wrought roof and rafter
Falls merrily back our laughter;
I hear the echoes after

More sweetly moan. This shore
As with hushed ages I hear rave
Around me. Foam and crooning cave
Sound more and more; sound in each wave,

Alone on that lone shore.
Through tribute realms I go,

And all life echoes my desire.
A pagan shrine with skins of wine

Drips, and our souls afire
Strike through the clouds. And over
Lanes lush with corn and clover
We stray, she and her lover.

The glad earth all aglow
Beneath the gentle sky — through mire,
Through glade and hall, by peak and pyre;
And ever so ; since all desire

I never can forego.

Our dreams outshine the world.

Far swathed beyond, long-visioned seas
Are empty, or from sky to shore

With great ships flash. Dark trees
Stir as with winds narcotic
From craggy vales chaotic,
For sea and land exotic

Abjure our common world.
I watch the glamorous centuries.
Which shape men's mimic pageantries.
In mist upcurled by these mute seas.

In this most magic world.

What dream shall be to-night —
Pent darkly now — that shall awake

My pregnant, deep, abysmal sleep
By forest, hill, and lake
Down ways and streets nocturnal,
By autumn fields and vernal;
Through lands fair and Infernal —

Mine through the magic night! —
Mine till pale dawn clouds, flake by flake,
Gleam, glow, redden, burst, and break.
The moon shines white. What dream shall wake

Me in what world to-night?

1. Melbourne Sonnets. 8. The Stock Exchange
2. Melbourne Sonnets. 4. On the Kerb
3. Promethean
4. Nightmare
5. The Flight of Puck

Bernard O'Dowd Evensong ("There was a time we had the power")

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