Than I whom Thou hast moulded from the clay, TO MY GODCHILD Francis M. W. Meynell (Extract) BY FRANCIS THOMPSON And when, immortal mortal, droops your head, I sure shall keep a younger company: The stately choice of the great Saintdom, meet- In sandalled shadow of the Triune feet; Pass by where wait, young poet-wayfarer, Your cousined clusters, emulous to share With you the roseal lightnings burning 'mid their hair; Pass the crystalline sea, the Lampads seven: Look for me in the nurseries of Heaven. THE FLOWER FACTORY BY FLORENCE WILKINSON EVANS Lisabetta, Marianina, Fiametta, Teresina, They are winding stems of roses, one by one, one by one, Little children who have never learned to play; Teresina softly crying that her fingers ache to-day; Tiny Fiametta nodding when the twilight slips in, gray. High above the clattering street, ambulance and firegong beat, They sit, curling crimson petals, one by one, one by one. Lisabetta, Marianina, Fiametta, Teresina, They have never seen a rosebush nor a dewdrop in the sun. They will dream of the vendetta, Teresina, Fiametta, Of a Black Hand and a face behind a grating; They will dream of cotton petals, endless, crimson, suffocating, Never of a wild-rose thicket nor the singing of a cricket, But the ambulance will bellow through the wanness of their dreams, And their tired lids will flutter with the street's hysteric screams. Lisabetta, Marianina, Fiametta, Teresina, They are winding stems of roses, one by one, one by one. Let them have a long, long playtime, Lord of Toil, when toil is done, Fill their baby hands with roses, joyous roses of the sun! THE FACTORIES BY MARGARET Widdemer I have shut my little sister in from life and light, (For a rose, for a ribbon, for a wreath across my hair,) I have made her restless feet still until the night, Locked from sweets of summer and from wild spring air; I who roamed the meadowlands, free from sun to sun, Free to sing and pull the buds and watch the far wings fly, I have bound my sister till her playing-time is doneOh, my little sister, was it I? Was it I? I have robbed my sister of her day of maidenhood, (For a robe, for a feather, for a trinket's restless spark,) Shut from Love till dusk shall fall, how shall she know good, How shall she go scatheless through the sunlit dark? I who could be innocent, I who could be gay, I who could have love and mirth before the light went by, I have shut my sister in her mating time away Sister, my young sister, was it I? Was it I? I have robbed my sister of the lips against her breast, (For a coin, for the weaving of my children's lace and lawn,) Feet that pace beside the loom, hands that cannot rest, How can she know motherhood, whose strength is gone? I, who took no heed of her, starved and labour-worn, I, against whose placid heart my sleepy gold-heads lie, Round my path they cry to me, little souls unbornGod of Life! Creator! It was I! It was I! THEY WILL SAY BY CARL SANDBURG Of my city the worst that men will ever say is this: You took little children away from the sun and the dew, And the glimmers that played in the grass under the great sky, And the reckless rain; you put them between walls To work, broken and smothered, for bread and wages, To eat dust in their throats and die empty-hearted For a little handful of pay on a few Saturday nights. A PITCHER OF MIGNONETTE BY HENRY CUYLER BUNNER A pitcher of mignonette In a tenement's highest casement,Queer sort of flower-pot-yet That pitcher of mignonette Is a garden in heaven set, To the little sick child in the basement The pitcher of mignonette, In a tenement's highest casement. RUFUS PRAYS By L. A. G. STRONG In the darkening church At the Litany Desk The idiot knelt and prayed. Rufus, stunted, uncouth, The one son of his mother. "Eh, I'd sooner 'ave Rufie," She said, "than many another: "'E's useful about the 'ouse And so gentle as 'e can be. And 'e gets up early o' mornin's, And makes me a cup o' tea." |