[Gutenberg 39741] • In My Nursery

Sweet! when first my baby ear

Curled itself and learned to hear,

'Twas your silver-singing voice

Made my baby heart rejoice.

Hushed upon your tender breast,

Soft you sang me to my rest;

Waking, when I sought my play,

Still your singing led the way.

Cradle songs, more soft and low

Than the bird croons on the bough;

Olden ballads, grave and gay,

Warrior's chant, and lover's lay.

So my baby hours went

In a cadence of content,

To the music and the rhyme

Keeping tune and keeping time.

So you taught me, too, ere long,

All our life should be a song,—

Should a faltering prelude be

To the heavenly harmony;

And with gracious words and high,

Bade me look beyond the sky,

To the Glory throned above,

To th' eternal Light and Love.

Many years have blossomed by:

Far and far from childhood I;

Yet its sunrays on me fall,

Here among my children all.

So among my babes I go,

Singing high and singing low;

Striving for the silver tone

Which my memory holds alone.

If I chant my little lays

Tunefully, be yours the praise;

If I fail, 'tis I must rue

Not t' have closelier followed you.