21 MAY 1927, Page 17

Poetry

Sea-Anemone

TOWARDS the beach an opelet floats,

With bright-pink tendrils, drifting free, And all the little common shrimps Arc filled with curiosity ;

They draw quite close, then dart in fear—

A crowd's dull sameness always strives To fly from beauty and from power As fatal to all common lives !

The opelet's arms of cherry-pink Round drifting films of weed are curled Softer than birds' feet clasp a branch — The gentlest touch in all the world.

But look, she feels her prey must still

Escape unless she now can hide ; She's found a tuft of thickset weed And softly coaxed herself inside—

Just hire some lovely, dangerous witch Retiring far within a wood, • Where she'll brew charms to rob the rich And freeze up all the poor man's blood.

CAMILLA DOYLE.