So I sit among the trellises and trees and wonder why: Clear the air as in my boyhood and as blue the unflecked sky, Full the leaves as ever blowing, sweet the bird songs and as free, But the boy’s heart that throbbed to them is untuned and dead in me. There’s a longing, longing, longing, speaking in a deep-drawn sigh, For the heart that throbbed in boyhood, cloudless as the azure sky; For the heart that was the sunlight and the air--that tongue nor pen Can ever paint or picture--that I cannot know again.
Never care as she lies asleep, Dear little lassie with red-brown hair; Angels of Light a sweet vigil keep, Keep for the little one slumbering there. Never a dream as she lies so still, Never a dream but of Fairyland, Fairyland and the flowers that fill Her bed, and the lilies within her hand.
Never a tear as she lies at rest, Now or ever or evermore; Never a sorrow to bruise her breast, Ever the gladness of fairylore. Never the rough way to bruise her feet, Never or ever a discord sound, Only the murmur of music sweet, And the laughing of Cherubim, all around.
Never a sigh from the silent lips, For the dollies all carefully laid away; Only the music of laughter slips Out of the realm of the sunlit day. Never or ever a thought or care, For the little hat with its flowered wreath, Bearing a vision of red-brown hair Flying in tangled curls beneath.
Dead? Ah, no! She is just asleep, Asleep where the dreams and daisies are; Angels of Light a sweet vigil keep, Keep in the light of a twinkling star. Asleep, and the odors of flowers fill Her bed, and the lilies within her hand; Asleep, and the whispering angels still Her sighs with the dreams of Fairyland.
These are golden days in Slowville; there is gladness up and down; For they’re sticking circus posters ’round the little country town. Flaming sheets of red and yellow on its every barn and fence Tell of wonders aggregated disregardful of expense. Tell of wildernesses threaded for the fierce Bigrigmajig; Tell of jungle-beasts made captive and of marvels small and big, “In a most stupendous spectacle of splendor and renown,” Say the flaming circus posters in the little country town.
They have wielded monster brushes from the dewy hours of morn, They have covered half of Jones’s barn with grandeur heaven-born; They have pictured fluffy ladies on the backs of dashing steeds, They have ornamented Slowville with a wealth of daring deeds; They have left a Ripperumptus on the back of Robbin’s fence, Captured in the wilds of Africa at marvelous expense; They’ve a retinue of big-eyed lads as they move up and down When they put up circus posters in the little country town.