Victoria College

No dignity of tall facades, no dusk
Loitering pensively amid cloistered halls.
No spires to dream beside forgotten streams
No lawns to lighten solemn elms.
Before, the crude clay falls
To make swift impact with the town;
Beyond, the gorse struggles stubbornly down
Nudging the bland austerity of my walls.

This gorse, growth stiffened for difficult places,
Grudges its fine gold with churlish spines.
I too, braced back against this chiselled scarp
Have grown hardily upon reluctant soil
And in the whirl and moil of hostile argument
Held constant root.
Firm now, I yield my wisdom not easily.
Only the creed-loosed dare be bold
To pluck it, and from this seed
The future-land unfold.