| |
| A CABIN, a cow and an apple-tree— | |
| These three things petition me; | |
| Neighborly close, and mine, all mine: | |
| The cabin covered with eglantine, | |
| Cow dark red with white spots over, | 5 |
| Up to her knees in honey clover; | |
| Apple-tree with a bird’s nest in, | |
| Made where the sunlight faeries spin | |
| Silks for shade and cover. | |
| |
I hear them trilling—the birds—
“Oh, yes— | 10 |
| You hear the cries of the street in stress, | |
| And a saffron guard with a traffic star | |
| Clutches and holds you where you are, | |
| Or you would be in a pretty mess | |
| Under a motor-car!” | 15 |
| |
| Thus my tiresome old sub-self, | |
| Tumbling down from her closet shelf, | |
| Packing her fardel of things forgot | |
| Saving me whether I will or not: | |
| |
| “It is wiser to dream all snug in bed, | 20 |
| Bed-posts standing foot and head, | |
| Roof-tree hiding the still white cry | |
| Of a midnight moon that is going by, | |
| Warding away the eerie spell | |
| From the windows close where the dreamers lie; | 25 |
| While the velvet tread | |
| Of the Dark comes soft to the mimic dead, | |
| And sweet as a sigh of Israfel.” | |
| |
| But what can one do if the visions snare | |
| In the market-place when the world is there? | 30 |
| What can one do to save her soul | |
| When without summons the films unroll? | |
| |
| Cabin covered with eglantine, | |
| Cherry red of the milken kine, | |
| An apple-tree, and in its crest | 35 |
| A robin’s song and a robin’s nest…. | |
| |
