3 OCTOBER 1931, Page 10

Autumn

LAY now aside thy morning veil of mist,

Fairest of all the Year's four daughters fair, And let me gaze into that glowing face, Those steady eyes, crowned with thy sunkissed hair.

How should I sing such beauty to the crowd Who love the garish red and white array Of those spoilt darlings of thy sister Spring, Her hoyden daughters April and fresh May ?

Theirs the bright ignis fatuus of the flesh, Which following history's foolish heroes died, Thine the rare spirit-sponsored loveliness By time and chance proven and glorified.

Flushed with the great, impending harmony t Vibrant (in every deep ecstatic breath), The chord of life, so soon to be resolved, Through thy triumphant dominant, to death.

FRANK MACDONALD.