Читать книгу Oxford Poetry 1917-1921 - Various Authors - Страница 14
ОглавлениеA CHILD'S VOICE
'Twas in a far back swallow-time
When the air was filled with chime
Of Sunday bells that danced in tune
With Eastern phantasies,
A child within a garden's boon
Oft sighed with saddened eyes.
A swallow screamed and wheeled at him
Beside the greenhouse door;
It knew that there he strove to limn
The need in his soul's core:
And he is lonely and sad who tells
His need to Sunday bells.
Of playfellows there was not one
To whom at wake of sun
The child might turn to speak a dream
Of lazy summer seas
O'er which a ship rode fair of beam
Bringing his soul's keys;
And how a wondrous alien boy
Trod proud that ship of Fate.
There mid the bells of Sunday joy
He whispered, "Come not late
Within my longing, for my play
Won't keep for any day."
"The greenhouse tank is stagnant now
Under the cherry bough;
And there a ship is by the quay,
The joy of my Baghdad.
Oh come, oh come and play with me
That I should not be sad."
The jewelled shade of evening's hood
Held many Eastern tales;
And cinnamon and sandalwood
Lurked in his camels' bales.
But then a swallow harshly screamed
And tumbled what he dreamed.
And that was back in swallow-time
With life a child's rhyme.
And some came true of what he dreamed,
And some has been forgot.
But life with sadness still is seamed,
And thorns take long to rot.
