AN EARLY START.
The dark had not unwrapped the skies
When I awoke, and rubbed my eyes.
The world was full of chirping birds,
I heard their soft, half-sleepy words.
I tiptoed softly on the floor,
I slipped the bolt, stole thro’ the door,
And lo! a wondrous world of gray
And silver mist before me lay.
The white dews wet my small bare feet,
As I ran thro’ the meadows, sweet
With clover nodding all about,
And sleepy hum-bees creeping out.
And then a strange thing came to pass;
The Sun was sleeping in the grass;
He must have wakened when I came,
For all at once a rosy flame
Peeped at me o’er a little mound,
And soon the bright Sun, warm and round
Was looking at me, smiling down
To see my little slumber-gown.
O fair the meadow was to see!
The blossoms laughed and spoke to me.
And drops like pearls in every place
Were hanging on the spider’s lace;
And little rainbows everywhere
Were dancing in the golden air;
And bees, and yellow butterflies,
And beetles, brown and big and wise,
Went buzzing, flying all about,
And busy ants ran in and out,
And songs were in the deep-blue sky,
—I could not see, they flew so high.
But all about these things I know,
Because the daisies whispered low,
And told me all they knew—much more
Than I had ever dreamed before.
And broad and white across the day
Before me ran the Shining Way.
