When We Were Very Young (12 page)

The Mirror

Between the woods the afternoon

Is fallen in a golden swoon,

The sun looks down from quiet skies

To where a quiet water lies,

And silent trees stoop down to trees.

And there I saw a white swan make

Another white swan in the lake;

And, breast to breast, both motionless,

They waited for the wind’s caress…

And all the water was at ease.

Halfway Down

Halfway down the stairs

Is a stair

Where I sit.

There isn’t any

Other stair

Quite like

It.

I’m not at the bottom,

I’m not at the top;

So this is the stair

Where

I always

Stop.

Halfway up the stairs

Isn’t up,

And isn’t down.

It isn’t in the nursery,

It isn’t in the town.

And all sorts of funny thoughts

Run round my head:

“It isn’t really

Anywhere!

It’s somewhere else

Instead!”

The Invaders

In careless patches through the wood

The clumps of yellow primrose stood,

And sheets of white anemones,

Like driven snow against the trees,

Had covered up the violet,

But left the blue-bell bluer yet.

Along the narrow carpet ride,

With primroses on either side,

Between their shadows and the sun,

The cows came slowly, one by one,

Breathing the early morning air

And leaving it still sweeter there.

And, one by one, intent upon

Their purposes, they followed on

In ordered silence…and were gone.

But all the little wood was still,

As if it waited so, until

Some blackbird on an outpost yew,

Watching the slow procession through,

Lifted his yellow beak at last

To whistle that the line had passed….

Then all the wood began to sing

Its morning anthem to the spring.

Before Tea

Emmeline

Has not been seen

For more than a week. She slipped between

The two tall trees at the end of the green…

We all went after her. “
Emmeline!
”

“Emmeline,

I didn’t mean—

I only said that your hands weren’t clean.”

We went to the trees at the end of the green….

But Emmeline

Was not to be seen.

Emmeline

Came slipping between

The two tall trees at the end of the green.

We all ran up to her. “Emmeline!

Where have you been?

Where have you been?

Why, it’s more than a week!” And Emmeline

Said, “Sillies, I went and saw the Queen.

She says my hands are
purfickly
clean!”

Teddy Bear

A bear, however hard he tries,

Grows tubby without exercise.

Our Teddy Bear is short and fat

Which is not to be wondered at;

He gets what exercise he can

By falling off the ottoman,

But generally seems to lack

The energy to clamber back.

Now tubbiness is just the thing

Which gets a fellow wondering;

And Teddy worried lots about

The fact that he was rather stout.

He thought: “If only I were thin!

But how does anyone begin?”

He thought: “It really isn’t fair

To grudge me exercise and air.”

For many weeks he pressed in vain

His nose against the window-pane,

And envied those who walked about

Reducing their unwanted stout.

None of the people he could see

“Is quite” (he said) “as fat as me!”

Then, with a still more moving sigh,

“I mean” (he said) “as fat as I!”

Now Teddy, as was only right,

Slept in the ottoman at night,

And with him crowded in as well

More animals than I can tell;

Not only these, but books and things,

Such as a kind relation brings—

Old tales of “Once upon a time,”

And history retold in rhyme.

One night it happened that he took

A peep at an old picture-book,

Wherein he came across by chance