O Spring! . . . On past occasions you have come
   Untarnished save, mayhap, by rain or snow,
Or colds, or influenza, or else some
   Vague pollen plague whose name we do not know.
But ne'er before - or so it sems to me --
Have politics disturbed your Arcady.

Golden the wattle glows by creek and hill;
   The laughing heathlands all are crimson clad;
Golden the gardens gleam, with daffodil
   And all those early blooms that make men glad.
But, where the flame-tipped gums nod to their kith,
A garish placard gurgles: "VOTE FOR SMITH."

Ah, me!  Ah, well!  The thrush is fluting now,
   And wren and robin twitter in the scrub,
While peach and plum put gay buds from the bough.
   (Smith holds today a meeting at the pub.)
The golden whistler sings with all his might.
(Brown speaks, I understand, tomorrow night.)

Smith?  Brown?  Ah, how may either hope to suit
   My mood, or seek to charm the heart of me?
If only each would bring along his lute
   And in soft numbers lisp his policy.
Of party plans and platforms let him sing,
And so attune his lilting voice to Spring.

What a vain hope!  Must I go forth to vote,
   Pausing awhile to hear the peewit call?
Enchanted by the thrush's rounded note,
   I'd probably forget to vote at all.
Then, heedless of such poet's pleas as mine,
'Tis likely they would mulet me in a fine.

A fine!  How could I pay, save with a rhyme?
   No legal tender this.  Ah, there's the rub!
The gross official mind scorns the sublime,
   (I'd better hear those speeches at the pub.)
Avaunt, sweet Spring!  Your glamors I must put
Aside.  There are far sterner things afoot.

"Den"
Herald, 30 August 1934, p6