Classic Poem

I shall write a song in the wood some day
With a long, lush fern for a pen,
Dipped in the rhythm of bird and brook
And the lisping sound of leaves at play
In the trees:
The boughs of the balsam will lean and look,
But I shall not sing of these.

With my waving fern,
My wise, wild pen,
I shall write of the hidden griefs of men,
And their hearts shall lie like an open book
Of troubled pages that sigh as they turn
On my knee.

But of one dim page, close-writ,
One memory—
Dead little song whose every note
Had birth within my throat,
And every word first in my heart was heard,
Its young beliefs, its lifting pride, its woe—
I shall not sing of it!
Not even the understanding wood shall know.