Till my life imbibed more shade than sun;
The swing from the bough still sweeps the air—
But the stranger’s children are swinging there.
He bubbles, the shady spring below,
With its bulrush brook where the hazels grow;
’Twas there I found the calamus root,
And watched the minnows poise and shoot,
And heard the robin lave his wing—
But the stranger’s bucket is at the spring.
Oh ye who daily cross the sill,