POETRY.
THREE POEMS BY VIE PRIEST
THE LITTLE WATERFALL.
Tins waterfall is little yet marvellous As it sings and swirls down its three-foot stair.
With delicate veins it pierces the tumbled sands ; With a host of voices it brims the cloven rocks.
A wise layman first told me of the place, And guided hither the hermit's cloistered feet.
Yet little guessed he of the peace my heart would know When water-music blends with the trance of prayer.
SUMMER EVENING.
STRIPS of shadow are shifting beneath the flowers ; Through the boughs of the fir-tree fragments of light pass.
0 evening hours, come you never so slow, Too soon you darken a summer day's delight.
LATE SNOW.
THE evening sun is lodged on the western hills, Yet their high folds are full of loitering snow ; Reckless winds scamper through its whirling fleece, A scurrying marmot shatters its brittle jade.
Mad they were, those people of the Overland, Who falsely told me the mountain flowers were come
Translated from the Chinese by ARTHUR WALEY.
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