Poem of the Day

I’m at my aunt and uncle’s house and my aunt has a book of poems by Rainer Maria Rilke. This is the first one I opened up to.

What birds plunge through is not the intimate space
By Rainer Maria Rilke

What birds plunge through is not the intimate space
in which you see all forms intensified.
(Out in the Open, you would be denied
your self, would disappear into that vastness.)

Space reaches from us and construes the world:
to know a tree, in its true element,
throw inner space around it, from that pure
abundance in you. Surround it with restraint.
It has no limits. Not till it is held
in your renouncing is it truly there.

So I’m at Heather’s house and I was going to post a poem from her. She doesn’t seem to have her books here, though, so I thought I’d post one of my favorite Emily Dickinson poems. When I was in grammar school we had an assembly by a group called Poetry Aloud! This was my favorite thing that they did. I recited it for my fourth graders, too, and they loved it!

I’m Nobody
By Emily Dickinson

I’m nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there’s a pair of us—don’t tell!
They’d banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

So I had breakfast with the ladies this morning, as usual. I can’t believe there’s only one more breakfast before I leave for the summer! Eek! Anyway, I found a book for my aunt at the UT Press book sale a couple weeks ago. It was a book of poems and stories by disabled people, edited by Vassar Miller, called Despite This Flesh. She brought this poem, which was the source of the title.

Rabbi Ben Ezra
By Robert Browning

Let us not always say,
“Spite of this flesh today
I strove, made head,
   gained ground upon the whole.”
As the bird wings and sings,
Let us cry, “All good
   things are ours,
   nor soul helps flesh
   more, now, than
   flesh helps soul!”

Did I mention that I love LotR?

Fish Riddle
FROM THE LORD OF THE RINGS
By J.R.R. Tolkien

Alive without breath;
as cold as death;
never thirsting, ever drinking;
clad in mail, never clinking.
Drowns on dry land,
thinks an island
is a mountain;
thinks a fountain
is a puff of air.
So sleek, so fair!
   What a joy to meet!
We only wish
to catch a fish,
   so juicy-sweet!

Oliphaunt
FROM THE LORD OF THE RINGS
By J.R.R. Tolkien

Grey as a mouse,
Big as a house,
Nose like a snake,
I make the earth shake,
As I tramp through the grass;
Trees crack as I pass.
With horns in my mouth
I walk in the South,
Flapping big ears.
Beyond count of years
I stump round and round,
Never lie on the ground,
Not even to die.
Oliphaunt am I,
Biggest of all,
Huge, old, and tall.
If ever you’d meet me
You wouldn’t forget me.
If you never do,
You won’t think I’m true;
But old Oliphaunt am I,
And I never lie.

This is one of my favorite poems ever. I read this for the fourth grade class for which I volunteered. They loved it! It’s a bit graphic for 9- and 10-year-olds, but they were quite involved with it. The teacher had to leave partway through my reading, and they were getting so worked up while she was gone that I was slightly concerned. When she came back they were all excited and she asked what had happened. They insisted I read it again! (I loved those kids!)

Anyway, this also reminds me of Anne of Green Gables, which I love, as well as Loreena McKennitt’s fantastic song! (Imagine how not surprised I was to find out that Heather adores Loreena McKennitt, too! We’re practically the same person!)

The Highwayman
By Alfred Noyes

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight, over the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding—
            Riding—riding—
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

He’d a French cocked-hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin,
A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin;
They fitted with never a wrinkle: his boots were up to the thigh!
And he rode with a jewelled twinkle,
            His pistol butts a-twinkle,
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled sky.

Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard,
And he tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred;
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
            Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

And dark in the old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim the ostler listened; his face was white and peaked;
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay,
But he loved the landlord’s daughter,
            The landlord’s red-lipped daughter,
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say—

“One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I’m after a prize to-night,
But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light;
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
            Watch for me by moonlight,
I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way.”

He rose upright in the stirrups; he scarce could reach her hand,
But she loosened her hair i’ the casement! His face burnt like a brand
As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his breast;
And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,
            (Oh, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)
Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped away to the West.

He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon;
And out o’ the tawny sunset, before the rise o’ the moon,
When the road was a gipsy’s ribbon, looping the purple moor,
A red-coat troop came marching—
            Marching—marching—
King George’s men came marching, up to the old inn-door.

They said no word to the landlord, they drank his ale instead,
But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed;
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at their side!
There was death at every window;
            And hell at one dark window;
For Bess could see, through the casement, the road that he would ride.

They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest;
They bound a musket beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast!
“Now keep good watch!” and they kissed her.
She heard the dead man say—
            Look for me by moonlight;
            Watch for me by moonlight;
I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way!

She twisted her hands behind her; but all the knots held good!
She writhed her hands till here fingers were wet with sweat or blood!
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years,
Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,
            Cold, on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!

The tip of one finger touched it; she strove no more for the rest!
Up, she stood up to attention, with the barrel beneath her breast,
She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive again;
For the road lay bare in the moonlight;
            Blank and bare in the moonlight;
And the blood of her veins in the moonlight throbbed to her love’s refrain.

Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot! Had they heard it? The horse-hoofs ringing clear;
Tlot-tlot, tlot-tlot, in the distance? Were they deaf that they did not hear?
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,
The highwayman came riding,
            Riding, riding!
The red-coats looked to their priming! She stood up straight and still!

Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night!
Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,
            Her musket shattered the moonlight,
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him—with her death.

He turned; he spurred to the West; he did not know who stood
Bowed, with her head o’er the musket, drenched with her own red blood!
Not till the dawn he heard it, his face grew grey to hear
How Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
            The landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.

Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high!
Blood-red were his spurs i’ the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat,
When they shot him down on the highway,
            Down like a dog on the highway,
And he lay in his blood on the highway, with a bunch of lace at his throat.

And still of a winter’s night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
A highwayman comes riding—
            Riding—riding—
A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.

Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard,
And he taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred;
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
            Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

This is in honor of Jennifer and David bringing a lovely child into the world.

The Children’s Hour
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Between the dark and the daylight,
When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day’s occupations,
That is known as the Children’s Hour.

I hear in the chamber above me
The patter of little feet,
The sound of a door that is opened,
And voices soft and sweet.

From my study I see in the lamplight,
Descending the broad hall stair,
Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra,
And Edith with golden hair.

A whisper, and then a silence:
Yet I know by their merry eyes
They are plotting and planning together
To take me by surprise.

A sudden rush from the stairway,
A sudden raid from the hall!
By three doors left unguarded
They enter my castle wall!

They climb up into my turret
O’er the arms and back of my chair;
If I try to escape, they surround me;
They seem to be everywhere.

They almost devour me with kisses,
Their arms about me entwine,
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine!

Do you think, o blue-eyed banditti,
Because you have scaled the wall,
Such an old mustache as I am
Is not a match for you all!

I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away!

I thought I’d take a break from “serious” poems and post a Shel Silverstein poem. I love Shel Silverstein. He cracks me up. This poem was always my favorite because I can be a bit of a drama queen myself (no comments, please!). It’s best read out loud with panache!

Little Abigail and the Beautiful Pony
By Shel Silverstein

There was a girl named Abigail
Who was taking a drive
Through the country
With her parents
When she spied a beautiful sad-eyed
Grey and white pony.
And next to it was a sign
That said,
FOR SALE—CHEAP.
“Oh,” said Abigail,
“May I have that pony?
May I please?”
And her parents said,
“No you may not.”
And Abigail said,
“But I MUST have that pony.”
And her parents said,
“Well, you can have a nice butter pecan
Ice cream cone when we get home.”
And Abigail said,
“I don’t want a butter pecan
Ice cream cone,
I WANT THAT PONY—
I MUST HAVE THAT PONY.”
And her parents said,
“Be quiet and stop nagging—
You’re not getting that pony.”
And Abigail began to cry and said,
“If I don’t get that pony I’ll die.”
And her parents said, “You won’t die.
No child ever died yet from not getting a pony.”
And Abigail felt so bad
That when she got home she went to bed,
And she couldn’t eat,
And she couldn’t sleep,
And her heart was broken,
And she DID die—
All because of a pony
That her parents wouldn’t buy.

(This is a good story
To read to your folks
When they won’t buy
You something you want.)

I chose this poem because I’ve been annoyed with some people lately and that makes me feel bad about myself. Though I will miss my friends this summer, I think it could be good to get away from some of the drama.

Blight
By: Edna St. Vincent Millay

Hard seeds of hate I planted
   That should by now be grown,—
Rough stalks, and from thick stamens
   A poisonous pollen blown,
And odors rank, unbreathable,
   From dark corollas thrown!

At dawn from my damp garden
   I shook the chilly dew;
The thin boughs locked behind me
   That sprang to let me through;
The blossoms slept,—I sought a place
   Where nothing lovely grew.

And there, when day was breaking,
   I knelt and looked around:
The light was near, the silence
   Was palpitant with sound;
I drew my hate from out my breast
   And thrust it in the ground.

Oh, ye so fiercely tended,
   Ye little seeds of hate!
I bent above your growing
   Early and noon and late,
Yet are ye drooped and pitiful,—
   I cannot rear ye straight!

The sun seeks out my garden,
   No nook is left in shade,
No mist nor mold nor mildew
   Endures on any blade,
Sweet rain slants under every bough:
   Ye falter, and ye fade.

I had breakfast with the ladies, as per my usual Friday routine. My aunt brought this poem, which I think is incredible! I definitely need to check out more of Naomi Shihab Nye’s work.

Kindness
By Naomi Shihab Nye

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

As I’ve previously mentioned, Edna St. Vincent Millay is my favorite poet. I never get tired of her poems, and I will likely post a lot of them. This poem jumped out at me the first time I read it. It’s not one of her well-known works, but I think it’s very powerful, especially the last two lines.

To a Friend Estranged From Me
By Edna St. Vincent Millay

Now goes under, and I watch it go under, the sun
That will not rise again.
Today has seen the setting, in your eyes cold and senseless as the sea,
Of friendship better than bread, and of bright charity
That lifts a man a little above the beasts that run.

That this could be!
That I should live to see
Most vulgar Pride, that stale obstreperous clown,
So fitted out with purple robe and crown
To stand among his betters! Face to face
With outraged me in this once holy place,
Where Wisdom was a favoured guest and hunted
Truth was harboured out of danger,
He bulks enthroned, a lewd, an insupportable stranger!

I would have sworn, indeed I swore it:
The hills may shift, the waters may decline,
Winter may twist the stem from the twig that bore it,
But never your love from me, your hand from mine.

Now goes under the sun, and I watch it go under.
Farewell, sweet light, great wonder!
You, too, farewell,-but fare not well enough to dream
You have done wisely to invite the night before the darkness came.

When I was a sophomore in high school, my English teacher was a bit… moody, shall we say. Most of the time she gave me A’s on my essays because I used PrintShop to make pretty covers. However, for our big paper on a poet (I chose Percy Bysshe Shelley), she gave me her college text with notes and tried to be helpful. Then she gave me a C without any comments whatsoever. I had only ever gotten one C in my life (in handwriting in fourth grade) and I was quite distressed. So I went to talk to her and she just said I hadn’t analyzed the poems enough. Good grief! I was a sophomore in HS and she was not a good teacher! What do you want from me? She ended up giving me a better grade after I cried. Ah, memories… Anyway, this was my favorite poem by Shelley.

Stanzas Written in Dejection Near Naples
By Percy Bysshe Shelley

The sun is warm, the sky is clear,
The waves are dancing fast and bright,
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear
The purple noon’s transparent might,
The breath of the moist air is light,
Around its unexpanded buds;
Like many a voice of one delight,
The winds’, the birds’, the ocean floods’,
The City’s voice itself, is soft like Solitude’s.

I see the Deep’s untrampled floor
With green and purple seaweeds strown;
I see the waves upon the shore,
Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown:
I sit upon the sands alone,—
The lightning of the noontide ocean
Is flashing round me, and a tone
Arises from its measured motion,
How sweet! did any heart now share in my emotion.

Alas! I have nor hope nor health,
Nor peace within nor calm around,
Nor that content surpassing wealth
The sage in meditation found,
And walked with inward glory crowned—
Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.
Others I see whom these surround—
Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;—
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.

Some might lament that I were cold,
As I, when this sweet day is done,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;
They might lament—for I am one
Whom men love not,—and yet regret,
Unlike this day which, when the sun
Shall on its stainless glory set,
Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet.

Yet now despair itself is mild,
Even as the winds and waters are;
I could lie down like a tired child,
And weep away the life of care
Which I have borne and yet must bear,
Till death like sleep might steal on me,
And I might feel in the warm air
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o’er my dying brain its last monotony.

I did a “dramatic” recitation of this poem when I volunteered at a fourth grade class as part of my children’s literature class in college. The kids loved it!

Jabberwocky
By Lewis Carroll

‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
  The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
  The frumious Bandersnatch!”

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
  Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
  And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
  The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
  And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
  The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
  He went galumphing back.

“And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
  Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
  He chortled in his joy.

‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.

It’s amazing what breakfast (especially if it’s a cinnamon roll) with the ladies can do for my spirits. My aunt brought in a book of poetry by Vassar Miller. We had read some of her poems when we were at the ranch for Thanksgiving, and I really liked them. I’m in charge of choosing one to discuss next week. (I might sneak an Edna St. Vincent Millay poem in there, too, though!)

Mrs. Lot
By Vassar Miller

There has to be something said for Lot’s
wife, for looking back, not moving on, for,
in other words, nostalgia, that onetwo
threefourfivesixseveneightnine letter
dirty word, when even Jesus for whom
she serves as reminder says to remember
her, and why else if he didn’t mean what
he said, understanding, of course, women
apt to cling to their homes, not having
in those days much else to cling to—and
what if they clung—like Lot’s poor wife whose
name we don’t even know to recall, she
having to pull up stakes and get out
just because some men liked other men, that
being none of her affair, beside which
she’d never liked Uncle Abraham’s loose
foot she swore he was born with, and so
she has long gazed back on the past which she
couldn’t put back any more than a pulled
tooth, for which crime she stands changed to a briny
pillar, still turned toward her yesterdays and
her God who surrounds her on all sides—right,
left, front, and back—her sad but salty stare.

Faux Pas
By Vassar Miller

I sat with you in a back pew when
your father died; for you, stared at so long,
would not gape at the helpless dead.

At your mother’s funeral I thought to sit
in the same place beside you, decent as always
to the point of fault. Who would have guessed!

Dear friend, forgive my unaverted eyes.
But there’s no back row of the mind to hide
here from the horror of your dying.

Bagatelle
FOR HELEN GREVE
By Vassar Miller

Of all the days dropped in time’s pocket
this day will seek acknowledgment
with a child’s shy asking,

because the love between us used
no word uncommoner than coffee,
and was never traced

by graphs of huge emotion. Yet
some fancy will recall this day
hallowed past recognition.

The Scuba Club meeting was interesting last night. We learned about fish identification, which is neat, even though I don’t dive. Lots of pretty pictures and fun stories!

Then we went to Wednesday Night Drinking Club. Blissfully, I did not repeat my performance of the last two weeks and get put in a cab by Rich to crash on Jacque’s chaise. I slept in my own bed, thank you very much! Plus, I drove several intoxicated people home.

The Suicide
By Edna St. Vincent Millay

“Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more!
Thou hast mocked me, starved me, beat my body sore!
And all for a pledge that was not pledged by me,
I have kissed thy crust and eaten sparingly
That I might eat again, and met thy sneers
With deprecations, and thy blows with tears,—
Aye, from thy glutted lash, glad, crawled away,
As if spent passion were a holiday!
And now I go. Nor threat, nor easy vow
Of tardy kindness can avail thee now
With me, whence fear and faith alike are flown;
Lonely I came, and I depart alone,
And know not where nor unto whom I go;
But that thou canst not follow me I know.”

Thus I to Life, and ceased; but through my brain
My thought ran still, until I spake again:

Ah, but I go not as I came,—no trace
Is mine to bear away of that old grace
I brought! I have been heated in thy fires,
Bent by thy hands, fashioned to thy desires,
Thy mark is on me! I am not the same
Nor ever more shall be, as when I came.
Ashes am I of all that once I seemed.
In me all’s sunk that leapt, and all that dreamed
Is wakeful for alarm,—oh, shame to thee,
For the ill change that thou hast wrought in me,
Who laugh no more nor lift my throat to sing
Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing
To have about the house when I was grown
If thou hadst left my little joys alone!
I asked of thee no favor save this one:
That thou wouldst leave me playing in the sun!
And this thou didst deny, calling my name
Insistently, until I rose and came.
I saw the sun no more.—It were not well
So long on these unpleasant thoughts to dwell,
Need I arise to-morrow and renew
Again my hated tasks, but I am through
With all things save my thoughts and this one night,
So that in truth I seem already quite
Free, and remote from thee,—I feel no haste
And no reluctance to depart; I taste
Merely, with thoughtful mien, an unknown draught,
That in a little while I shall have quaffed.”

Thus I to Life, and ceased, and slightly smiled,
Looking at nothing; and my thin dreams filed
Before me one by one till once again
I set new words unto an old refrain:

“Treasures thou hast that never have been mine!
Warm lights in many a secret chamber shine
Of thy gaunt house, and gusts of song have blown
Like blossoms out to me that sat alone!
And I have waited well for thee to show
If any share were mine,—and now I go
Nothing I leave, and if I naught attain
I shall but come into mine own again!”

Thus I to Life, and ceased, and spake no more,
But turning, straightway, sought a certain door
In the rear wall. Heavy it was, and low
And dark,—a way by which none e’er would go
That other exit had, and never knock
Was heard thereat,—bearing a curious lock
Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily,
Whereof Life held content the useless key,
And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust,
Whose sudden voice across a silence must,
I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear,—
A strange door, ugly like a dwarf.—So near
I came I felt upon my feet the chill
Of acid wind creeping across the sill.
So stood longtime, till over me at last
Came weariness, and all things other passed
To make it room; the still night drifted deep
Like snow about me, and I longed for sleep.

But, suddenly, marking the morning hour,
Bayed the deep-throated bell within the tower!
Startled, I raised my head,—and with a shout
Laid hold upon the latch,—and was without.

Ah, long-forgotten, well-remembered road,
Leading me back unto my old abode,
My father’s house! There in the night I came,
And found them feasting, and all things the same
As they had been before. A splendour hung
Upon the walls, and such sweet songs were sung
As, echoing out of very long ago,
Had called me from the house of Life, I know.
So fair their raiment shone I looked in shame
On the unlovely garb in which I came;
Then straightway at my hesitancy mocked:
“It is my father’s house!” I said and knocked;
And the door opened. To the shining crowd
Tattered and dark I entered, like a cloud,
Seeing no face but his; to him I crept,
And “Father!” I cried, and clasped his knees, and wept.

Ah, days of joy that followed! All alone
I wandered through the house. My own, my own,
My own to touch, my own to taste and smell,
All I had lacked so long and loved so well!
None shook me out of sleep, nor hushed my song,
Nor called me in from the sunlight all day long.

I know not when the wonder came to me
Of what my father’s business might be,
And whither fared and on what errands bent
The tall and gracious messengers he sent.
Yet one day with no song from dawn till night
Wondering, I sat, and watched them out of sight.
And the next day I called; and on the third
Asked them if I might go,—but no one heard.
Then, sick with longing, I arose at last
And went unto my father,—in that vast
Chamber wherein he for so many years
Has sat, surrounded by his charts and spheres.
“Father,” I said, “Father, I cannot play
The harp that thou didst give me, and all day
I sit in idleness, while to and fro
About me thy serene, grave servants go;
And I am weary of my lonely ease.
Better a perilous journey overseas
Away from thee, than this, the life I lead,
To sit all day in the sunshine like a weed
That grows to naught,—I love thee more than they
Who serve thee most; yet serve thee in no way.
Father, I beg of thee a little task
To dignify my days,—’tis all I ask
Forever, but forever, this denied,
I perish.”
            ”Child,” my father’s voice replied,
“All things thy fancy hath desired of me
Thou hast received. I have prepared for thee
Within my house a spacious chamber, where
Are delicate things to handle and to wear,
And all these things are thine. Dost thou love song?
My minstrels shall attend thee all day long.
Or sigh for flowers? My fairest gardens stand
Open as fields to thee on every hand.
And all thy days this word shall hold the same:
No pleasure shalt thou lack that thou shalt name.
But as for tasks—” he smiled, and shook his head;
“Thou hadst thy task, and laidst it by,” he said.