New Zealand Verse/Sonnet
CXXXIV.
Sonnet.
There be some songs that, whosoever singeth,
Still fall in measured cadence on the ear;
And soft and slow their music ever ringeth
Adown the weary waning of the year.
All may not think their strains divinest rapture,
But unto us their faintest echo seems
Like unto those that all our senses capture,
Heard in the fairy realms of sweetest dreams;
And the spell lies in touch of mem’ry’s fingers
That wakes within our hearts some answering note—
A note whose blessed sweetness ever lingers
Like the dear sounds from some rare song-bird’s throat;
A lingering note that, from the past, doth borrow
Something of long-gone joy or half-sweet sorrow.
Still fall in measured cadence on the ear;
And soft and slow their music ever ringeth
Adown the weary waning of the year.
All may not think their strains divinest rapture,
But unto us their faintest echo seems
Like unto those that all our senses capture,
Heard in the fairy realms of sweetest dreams;
And the spell lies in touch of mem’ry’s fingers
That wakes within our hearts some answering note—
A note whose blessed sweetness ever lingers
Like the dear sounds from some rare song-bird’s throat;
A lingering note that, from the past, doth borrow
Something of long-gone joy or half-sweet sorrow.
Clara Singer Poynter.