The Spike: or, Victoria University College Review, October 1918
Lights That Fail
Lights That Fail
Hope built a beacon upon a high hill;
Fools poured their scorn on it—
Hope tended it still.
Rains beat upon it of studies disdain,
Winds of obloquy came down with the rain.
Broad-browed professors explained it away;
Students made fun of it—
And turned to their play.
Booklore and feasting their night occupied—
Out on the hill-top it flickered and died.
Hope left his watching high up on the hill—
Hope left his substance there; —
Turned, famished, to swill
Stuff for the million (the soul of him died
Out on the hill-top) his maw satisfied.
H.M.