A fugitive drift of faint perfume,
A poem caught on a spray,
The loquat branches are all in bloom,
The delicate blooms of May.
All day, all day, the last late bees
(Forgetting their day was done)
Laboured and roamed in the loquat trees,
In the last light warmth of the sun.
All day, all day, the quiet airs heard,
Hung from a grey gum's sconce;
The shaken bells of the butcher bird
(Warble and laugh at once)
Till the sun dropped down and the shy stars came
In ones and twos and threes;
Till night was nothing but stars, aflame,
In glorious companies.
A fugitive drift of faint perfume,
A poem caught on a spray;
The loquat's glimmering boughs illume
The delicate nights of May.
First published in The Sydney Morning Herald, 19 May 1934
