POETRY.
OLD HUSS.
IN mute companionship the lamp showed clear
Gay patterned colours of the patchwork quilt Deft fingers once had stitched with young content.
A broken Bible-cover propped upright Shaded the pillow and that dark weary head.
He stared upon the fire with his small eyes From under grizzled brows like hedgerow wisps Of seeding clematis. His skinny hands And the taut muscles of stretched throat and neck Writhed like bared furze roots. Nothing in old Huss But had some counterpart in the rugged hills.
Thoughts wandered through his mind " Beech-logs burn well.
Strange double things they do be—fire and frost.
That same log when 'twas part of a growing tree Cooled with its green shade many a time my sweat.
Jes 'bove the Pike road, use ter stand—I mind Losen a tree far more'n a man—I mind—" Then breathing stertorously he sank to rest As dreamless as the slumber of a stone That holds imprisoned sponges petrified.
A. HUGH FISHER.
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