fear

NO easy matter 'tis to hold,
Against its owner's will, the fleece
Who troubled by the itching smart
Of Cupid's irritating dart,
Eager awaits some Jason bold
To grant release.
E'en dragon huge, or flaming steer,
When Jason's loved will cause no fear.

Duennas, grating, bolt and lock,
All obstacles can naught avail;
Constraint is but a stumbling block;
For youthful ardour must prevail.
Girls are precocious nowadays,
Look at the men with ardent gaze,
And longings' an infinity;

Have you ever heard the wind go "Yooooo"?
'T is a pitiful sound to hear!
It seems to chill you through and through
With a strange and speechless fear.
'T is the voice of the night that broods outside
When folk should be asleep,
And many and many's the time I've cried
To the darkness brooding far and wide
Over the land and the deep:
Whom do you want, O lonely night,
That you wail the long hours through?"
And the night would say in its ghostly way:
"Yoooooooo!
Yoooooooo!
Yoooooooo!"

The red sun on the lonely lands
   Gazed, under clouds of rose,
As one who under knitted hands
   Takes one last look and goes.

Then Pain, with her white sister Fear,
   Crept nearer to my bed:
"The sands are running; dost thou hear
   Thy sobbing heart?" she said.

There came a rider to the gate,
   And stern and clear spake he:
"For meat or drink thou must not wait,
   But rise and ride with me."

I waited not for meat or drink,
   Or kiss, or farewell kind --

To-night I tread the unsubstantial way
That looms before me, as the thundering night
Falls on the ocean: I must stop, and pray
One little prayer, and then - what bitter fight
Flames at the end beyond the darkling goal?
These are my passions that my feet must read;
This is my sword, the fervour of my soul;
This is my Will, the crown upon my head.
For see! the darkness beckons: I have gone,
Before this terrible hour, towards the gloom,
Braved the wild dragon, called the tiger on

I.

Dark was the dawn, and o'er the deep
The boist'rous whirlwinds blew;
The Sea-bird wheel'd its circling sweep,
And all was drear to view--
When on the beach that binds the western shore
The love-lorn ZELMA stood, list'ning the tempest's roar.


II.

Her eager Eyes beheld the main,
While on her DRACO dear
She madly call'd, but call'd in vain,
No sound could DRACO hear,
Save the shrill yelling of the fateful blast,
While ev'ry Seaman's heart, quick shudder'd as it past.

On March 1, 1958, four deserters from the French Army of North Africa,
August Rein, Henri Bruette, Jack Dauville, & Thomas Delain, robbed a
government pay station at Orleansville. Because of the subsequent
confession of Dauville the other three were captured or shot. Dauville
was given his freedom and returned to the land of his birth, the U.S.A.

AUGUST REIN:
from a last camp near St. Remy

I dig in the soft earth all
afternoon, spacing the holes
a foot or so from the wall.

Perhaps already you may know
SIR BLENNERHASSET PORTICO?
A Captain in the Navy, he -
A Baronet and K.C.B.
You do? I thought so!
It was that Captain's favourite whim
(A notion not confined to him)
That RODNEY was the greatest tar
Who ever wielded capstan-bar.
He had been taught so.

"BENBOW! CORNWALLIS! HOOD! - Belay!
Compared with RODNEY" - he would say -
"No other tar is worth a rap!
The great LORD RODNEY was the chap
The French to polish!
"Though, mind you, I respect LORD HOOD;

By the winding Wollondilly where the weeping willows weep,
And the shepherd, with his billy, half awake and half asleep,
Folds his fleecy flocks that linger homewards in the setting sun
Lived my hero, Jim the Ringer, "cocky" on Mylora Run.
Jimmy loved the super's daughter, Miss Amelia Jane McGrath.
Long and earnestly he sought her, but he feared her stern papa;
And Amelia loved him truly -- but the course of love, if true,
Never yet ran smooth or duly, as I think it ought to do.

THE Lombard princes oft pervade my mind;
The present tale Boccace relates you'll find;
Agiluf was the noble monarch's name;
Teudelingua he married, beauteous dame,
The last king's widow, who had left no heir,
And whose dominions proved our prince's share.

No Beauty round compare could with the queen;
And ev'ry blessing on the throne was seen,
When Cupid, in a playful moment, came,
And o'er Agiluf's stable placed his flame;
There left it carelessly to burn at will,
Which soon began a muleteer to fill,

Here in my mountain home,
On rugged hills and steep,
I sit and watch you come,
O Riverinia Sheep!
You come from the fertile plains
Where saltbush (sometimes) grows,
And flats that (when it rains)
Will blossom like the rose.

But when the summer sun
Gleams down like burnished brass,
You have to leave your run
And hustle off for grass.

'Tis then that -- forced to roam --
You come to where I keep,
Here in my mountain home,
A boarding-house for sheep.