Inez K. Hyland

To a Wave

Where were you yesterday? In Gulistan,
 With roses and the frenzied nightingales?
Rather would I believe you shining ran
 With peaceful floods, where the soft voice prevails
Of building doves in lordly trees set high,
 Trees which enclose a home where love abides —
His love and hers, a passioned ecstasy;
 Your tone has caught its echo and derides
My joyless lot, as face down pressed I lie
 Upon the shifting sand, and hear the reeds
Voicing a thin, dissonant threnody
 Unto the cliff and wind-tormented weeds.
As with the faint half-lights of jade toward
 The shore you come and show a violet hue,
I wonder if the face of my adored
 Was ever held importraitured by you.
Ah, no! if you had seen his face, still prest
 Within your hold the picture dear would be,
Like that bright portrait which so moved the breast
 Of fairest Gurd with soft unrest that she,
Born in ice halls, she who but raised her eyes
 And scornful questioned, "What is love, indeed?
None ever viewed it 'neath these northern skies," —
 Seeing the face soon learned love's gentle creed;
But you hold nothing to be counted dear —
 Only a gift of weed and broken shells;
Yet I will gather one, so I can hear
 The soft remembrance which still in it dwells:
For in the shell, though broken, ever lies
 The murmur of the sea whence it was torn —
So in a woman's heart there never dies
 The memory of love, though love be lorn.

Bread and Wine

A cup of opal
 Through which there glows
The cream of the pearl,
 The heart of the rose;
And the blue of the sea
 Where Australia lies,
And the amber flush
 Of her sunset skies,
And the emerald tints
 Of the dragon fly
Shall stain my cup
 With their brilliant dye.
And into this cup
 I would pour the wine
Of youth and health
 And the gifts divine
Of music and song,
 And the sweet content
Which must ever belong
 To a life well spent.
And what bread would I break
 With my wine, think you?
The bread of a love
 That is pure and true.