From the Sanscrit by Sir William Jones
On parents’ knees, a naked, new-born child,
Weeping thou sat’st when all around thee smiled:
So live, that, sinking in thy last long sleep,
Thou then mayst smile while all around thee weep.
-
-
Just when each bud was big with bloom,
And as prophetic of perfume,
When spring, with her ight horoscope,
Was sweet as an unuttered hope;Just when the last star flickered out,
And twilight, like a soul in doubt,
Hovered between the dark and dawn,
And day lay waiting to be born;Just when the gray and dewy air...
-
Where did you come from, baby dear?
Out of the everywhere into the here.Where did you get your eyes so blue?
Out of the sky as I came through.What makes the light in them sparkle and spin?
Some of the starry spikes left in.Where did you get that little tear?
I found it waiting when I got here.What makes your forehead...
-
“how many pounds does the baby weigh—
Baby who came but a month ago?
How many pounds from the crowning curl
To the rosy point of the restless toe?”Grandfather ties the ’kerchief knot,
Tenderly guides the swinging weight,
And carefully over his glasses peers
To read the record, “Only eight.”Softly the echo goes around...
-
In praise of little children I will say
God first made man, then found a better way
For woman, but his third way was the best.
Of all created things, the loveliest
And most divine are children. Nothing here
Can be to us more gracious or more dear.
And though, when God saw all his works were good,
There was no rosy flower of babyhood,... -
I.
a Baby’s feet, like sea-shells pink,
Might tempt, should Heaven see meet,
An angel’s lips to kiss, we think,
A baby’s feet.Like rose-hued sea-flowers toward the heat
They stretch and spread and wink
Their ten soft buds that part and meet.No flower-bells that expand and shrink
Gleam half so heavenly sweet... -
Nae shoon to hide her tiny taes,
Nae stockin’ on her feet;
Her supple ankles white as snaw,
Or early blossoms sweet.Her simple dress o’ sprinkled pink,
Her double, dimplit chin,
Her puckered lips an’ baumy mou’,
With na ane tooth within.Her een sae like her mither’s een,
Twa gentle, liquid things;
... -
[In Ireland they have a pretty fancy that when a child smiles in its sleep it is “talking with angels.”]
A BABY was sleeping;
Its mother was weeping;
For her husband was far on the wild raging sea;
And the tempest was swelling
Round the fisherman’s dwelling;
And she cried, “Dermot, darling! O come back to me!”... -
From “The Princess”
...
SWEET and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea,
Low, low, breathe and blow,
Wind of the western sea!
Over the rolling waters go,
Come from the dying moon, and blow,
Blow him again to me;
While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps. -
The Busy day is over,
The household work is done;
The cares that fret the morning
Have faded with the sun;
And in the tender twilight,
I sit in happy rest,
With my precious rosy baby
Asleep upon my breast.White lids with silken fringes
Shut out the waning light;
A little hand close folded,
Holds mamma’s...