To a Mandolin [poem by Agnes L. Storrie]

[Editor: This poem by Agnes L. Storrie was published in Poems, 1909.]

To a Mandolin.

Oh! foolish little twittering mandolin
Thrilling with emotions just as thin
And flimsy as the ribbons, pink and blue,
And amber-tinted, that envelop you.
Oh ! mimic passion, striking tinsel chords,
Playing with earnestness, as children play with swords,
Skimming across love’s vast and unplumbed deeps,
With flittering touches, as a swallow sweeps
The surface of unfathomable seas,
Her silken wing brushing immensities.
Oh ! heed thee, swallow ! lest thou haply lose thyself,
And the great sea thy little form engulf.
Oh ! heed thee, mandolin ! lest o’er thy mimic woes,
A wave of real passion sudden overflows.

Source:
Agnes L. Storrie. Poems, J. W. Kettlewell, Sydney, 1909, page 37