Page:Poems Forrest.djvu/54

The rainbow ribboned above its gleaming,
 And, as a mirror of copper shows
 A queen's flushed cheek, it was painted rose
By the agile dawn with the mauve mists scheming;
 And ere the sun in the hot hills slept
 He had flung gold arrows to test its depth.

By the small gilt horns of the new moon ambered
 The feathery night-moths came there to feed;
 And, to certain death in their scrambling greed,
A fated army: the black ants clambered,
 And many a lovely, foolish thing
 Was dragged to death thro' a honeyed wing.

Then there came a grocer to walk that way,
 And he crushed the fern with his placid feet,
 And he found the pool that was golden sweet
When the air was tender as new-mown hay;
 And he drained that pool, for it seemed no sin,
 And he packed it all into squares of tin.

You can buy it now in the nearest shop—
 There's a State-fixed charge, so you won't pay over
 The standard price if it taste of clover,
Or you find a rainbow in every drop,
 For no man can rate such magic things
 As the iridescence on wild moths' wings!

The song of the lark or an iris petal,
 The green delights of a beetle's back,
 Unscheduled compounds he came to pack
In a labelled tin of the homeliest metal:
 Just take your honey, and don't suppose
 That the serious soul of the grocer knows!