Vonda Stanley's collection of early Australian bush poems

THE SKULL

 

O bowl that held the hot imprisoned fire,

Cup where the sacred essence used to burn---

That fluent essence that shall ne'er return---

Old home of Aspiration and Desire:

What art thou now to humour and admire?

A thing inconsequential one might spurn,

Thou art not e'en the scattered ashes' urn;---

Husk of the spirit that shall not expire.

 

Thou cage and shell of ancient busy Thought,

Nurse-house of Soul, the domicile of him

Long fled thy osseous walls that Nature wrought

To please proud Time's caprice and passing whim;

'Twixt two eternities a moment caught,

He rose from thee to join the seraphim.

 

Mary E Fullerton 1868 - 1946

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