How shall I paint in words thine image fair,
Set in a background of red-winged light,
Glinting through portieres of soft foliage there,
Gold-flecked ere fading into deepening night?
List to the music of cascades which pour
Their liquid silver tribute down the steep
To moss-clad boulders, where it bubbles o'er,
And fronoled ferns in verdurous beauty peep.
Breathless I wait near thy pellucid stream
To view some woodland nymph with flashing feet
And brow, flower-bound for this alluring dream --
A witching Flora in this cool retreat.
Pensive I grow until the bell-bird's note --
Organ-like, pealing in its grand solemnity- -
Brings haunting memories, as the deep tones float,
Of vanished hours -- lost chords of melody.
Crowned in magnificence is thy majestic head,
Queenly thy royal robe of purple grace,
With tender nuausem o'er dewy verdure spread,
Where the Pacific's jasper waves embrace.
Whether in winnowed raiment of the crystal dawn,
Or golden mantle of the sun's rich ore,
Or jewelled scarf star studded round thee worn,
Thy smiles or tears but charm me more and more.
Farewell, thy statey beauty! Stay -- a thought
Hath touched the deep recesses of my soul --
Thou standest, thou Colossus, tempest wrought,
A Beacon on Time's sea to mark a shoal!
First published in The Brisbane Courier, 9 July 1913;
and later in
Stella Australis: Poems and Verses and Prose Fragments by Emily Coungeau, 1914; and
Rustling Leaves: Selected Poems by Emily Coungeau, 1920.
Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography
See also.
Set in a background of red-winged light,
Glinting through portieres of soft foliage there,
Gold-flecked ere fading into deepening night?
List to the music of cascades which pour
Their liquid silver tribute down the steep
To moss-clad boulders, where it bubbles o'er,
And fronoled ferns in verdurous beauty peep.
Breathless I wait near thy pellucid stream
To view some woodland nymph with flashing feet
And brow, flower-bound for this alluring dream --
A witching Flora in this cool retreat.
Pensive I grow until the bell-bird's note --
Organ-like, pealing in its grand solemnity- -
Brings haunting memories, as the deep tones float,
Of vanished hours -- lost chords of melody.
Crowned in magnificence is thy majestic head,
Queenly thy royal robe of purple grace,
With tender nuausem o'er dewy verdure spread,
Where the Pacific's jasper waves embrace.
Whether in winnowed raiment of the crystal dawn,
Or golden mantle of the sun's rich ore,
Or jewelled scarf star studded round thee worn,
Thy smiles or tears but charm me more and more.
Farewell, thy statey beauty! Stay -- a thought
Hath touched the deep recesses of my soul --
Thou standest, thou Colossus, tempest wrought,
A Beacon on Time's sea to mark a shoal!
First published in The Brisbane Courier, 9 July 1913;
and later in
Stella Australis: Poems and Verses and Prose Fragments by Emily Coungeau, 1914; and
Rustling Leaves: Selected Poems by Emily Coungeau, 1920.
Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography
See also.
