Classic Poem

A MONG his books he sits all day
— To think and read and write;
He does not smell the new-mown hay,
— The roses red and white.

I walk among them all alone,
— His silly, stupid wife;
The world seems tasteless, dead and done —
— An empty thing is life.

At night his window casts a square
— Of light upon the lawn;
I sometimes walk and watch it there
— Until the chill of dawn.

I have no brain to understand
— The books he loves to read;
I only have a heart and hand
— He does not seem to need.

He calls me " Child " — lays on my hair
— Thin fingers, cold and mild;
Oh! God of Love, who answers prayer,
— I wish I were a child!

And no one sees and no one knows
— (He least would know or see),
That ere Love gathers next year's rose
— Death will have gathered me.