14 MAY 1892, Page 16

POETRY.

The sunshine from my heart: 'tis quite de trop ; But it won't vanish!

"Court pessimism," urge my cultured friends : "Think how brute-force the world sets spinning blindly; How to blank misery existence tends ! "

(They mean it kindly.) "Surely," they cry, "at least you can despair ? Condemn to darkness all that once seemed brightest? Feel you no loathing for the fate you share ?" No—not the slightest!

Yet Fortune too has mocked me with her moods : Her fickle wings, alack ! she's lightly shaken; And left me Care for comrade : while my goods The jade has taken.

"Well then? "—well then, I smile : (and so 'twere vain For poor contentment's slave to ape the poet :) "You think God's Balance tilts the loss with gain P" Nay, friend,—I know it !

R. K. H.