POETRY.
A GREY PARROT.
HE sits behind his cloister bars As grave as Solon :
He looks, like Kepler, at the stars : He's one of those who never speak Until they've stopped to think ; his beak A semicolon.
In him all lighter thoughts are sunk ; His cares are higher.
He lives as doth a tonsured monk ; He merely eats to praise the Lord, Like some Franciscan of the cord, Or poor Grey Friar.
No Aineur he, or vain quidnunc, Or idle tattler;
Learned and critical as Brunck, He'll chew a metaphysic stalk In silence—an he liked he'd talk As well as Littler.
His eyes are like the palmers' beads With which, in Latin, They told their prayers and pious creeds, Their " Pater " and " Magnificat," Their " Ayes," " Credos," and all that, At eve and matin. He envieth not the bold game-cock With all his harem :
He shunneth all the sex en bloc
(They turn the mind from prayer). As fits A holy hermit, so he sits
A censor morum,.
WILLIAM HOLLOWAY, B.A. (Oxon).
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