Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume V. Nature. 1904. | | | | VI. Animate Nature | | The O’Lincoln Family | | Wilson Flagg (1805–1884) |
| | | A FLOCK of merry singing-birds were sporting in the grove: | |
| Some were warbling cheerily, and some were making love: | |
| There were Bobolincon, Wadolincon, Winter seeble, Conquedle,— | |
| A livelier set was never led by tabor, pipe, or fiddle— | |
| Crying, “Phew, shew, Wadolincon, see, see, Bobolincon, | 5 |
| Down among the tickletops, hiding in the buttercups! | |
| I know the saucy chap, I see his shining cap | |
| Bobbing in the clover there,—see, see, see!” | |
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| Up flies Bobolincon, perching on an apple-tree, | |
| Startled by his rival’s song, quickened by his raillery; | 10 |
| Soon he spies the rogue afloat, curvetting in the air, | |
| And merrily he turns about, and warns him to beware! | |
| “’T is you that would a-wooing go, down among the rushes O! | |
| But wait a week, till flowers are cheery,—wait a week, and, ere you marry, | |
| Be sure of a house wherein to tarry! | 15 |
| Wadolink, Whiskodink, Tom Denny, wait, wait, wait!” | |
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| Every one ’s a funny fellow; every one ’s a little mellow; | |
| Follow, follow, follow, follow, o’er the hill and in the hollow! | |
| Merrily, merrily, there they hie; now they rise and now they fly; | |
| They cross and turn, and in and out, and down in the middle, and wheel about,— | 20 |
| With a “Phew, shew, Wadolincon! listen to me, Bobolincon!— | |
| Happy ’s the wooing that ’s speedily doing, that ’s speedily doing, | |
| That ’s merry and over with the bloom of the clover! | |
| Bobolincon, Wadolincon, Winterseeble, follow, follow me!” | | | | |
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