⁠⁠Bird of the meadow,
⁠⁠Sunlight and shadow,
Swaying at ease on the tall blooming math,
⁠⁠Blissfully swinging,
⁠⁠Gleefully singing,
Where the low breezes join in the laugh.

⁠⁠Once so cheerily,
⁠⁠Now so drearily,
Run these sad hours in the long stony street;
⁠⁠No dale or mountain,
⁠⁠Grain-field or fountain,
Only the clamor, the dust, and the heat.

⁠⁠Here thou art dozing,
⁠⁠Sadly reposing,
Hiding thy head 'neath a poor prisoned wing,
⁠⁠Dreaming of heaven,
⁠⁠Whence thou wast riven,
And all the glad light and the glory of spring.

⁠⁠Sweet little lover,
⁠⁠Scenting the clover,
Brushing the dewdrops in dreams from the spray,
⁠⁠Where are thy loved ones?
⁠⁠Where are thy lost ones?
Mournful, I ween, is thy poor captive lay.

⁠⁠Oh, it was needless,
⁠⁠This act so heedless,
To prison thee here in a dull city room;
⁠⁠Hostage of gladness,
⁠⁠Given to sadness,
Born out of sunlight and music and bloom.

⁠⁠See, he is waking,
⁠⁠His pinions shaking,
And out pours a flood-tide of melody bright;
⁠⁠Now it is rushing,
⁠⁠Gurgling and gushing,
Like the clear stream of the soul's pure delight.

⁠⁠Oh, the sweet feeling,
⁠⁠Rippling and reeling,
Tipsy with glee as it pours from his heart!
⁠⁠Naught can I summon,
⁠⁠Divine or human,
To paint, sweet enchanter, all that thou art.

⁠⁠Steeped in contentment,
⁠⁠Naught of resentment
Lurks in the bliss of thy rollicking strain:
⁠⁠Spurning thy durance,
⁠⁠With perfect assurance
That solely to live is an infinite gain.

⁠⁠Blessed forerunner
⁠⁠Of changeless summer,
Ecstacy's home is thy dear little breast;
⁠⁠Tell me thy secret;
⁠⁠Canst thou reveal it?
Tell me, oh tell me, why thou art blest.

⁠⁠Then shall these places
⁠⁠Blossom with graces,
Where I have sighed so long to be free;
⁠⁠Sharing thy spirit,
⁠⁠All joy to inherit,
Captive, oh, then shall captivity be.

The west has lost its golden glow,
The tall white lilacs stand a-row
⁠Behind the beds of musk;
The woodbine climbs the garden rail,
And in the copse the nightingale
⁠Is singing through the dusk.

We stand beside the cedar-tree,
We mark, as far as eyes can see,
⁠Our garden's utmost bound;
The level lawn, the beds of bloom,
The elms beyond the hedge of broom,
⁠And all is hallowed ground.

We pace the bordered garden walk,
Where best she loved to play and talk
⁠About the bees and flowers;
Among the lilies she would flit,
Or, lily-like, beside them sit
⁠The long sunshiny hours.

Full oft we wove them for a crown
To deck the ringlets, chestnut-brown,
⁠That on her shoulders strayed.
Ah, Heaven! how fond, how blind we were,
We thought her more than earthly fair,
⁠And yet were not afraid.

We might have known a soul so white
Was God's, was Heaven's, by holy right,
⁠And never could be ours;
We might have known we could not keep
The child whose thoughts were grave and deep,
⁠And pure as lily flowers.

Too good, too fair, too pure for us,
But when keen anguish pierces thus,
⁠The bleeding heart will faint;
And we must madly wish awhile
That she could barter for our smile
⁠The palm-branch of the saint.

We cannot say we feel it best
That she was taken from our breast,
⁠While such hot pulses stir;
And thinking of the new-turned sod,
We cannot, all at once, thank God,
⁠That he has gathered her.

We can but look with bitter tears
Backward and forward o'er the years.
⁠God's will our life has crossed!
We can but let that will be done,
We can but pray that she has won
⁠Far more than we have lost.

God may be good to us, and give
Such comfort as will let us live
⁠In peace from day to day;
But joy will only dawn that hour
Wherein we see our lily flower
⁠In regions far away.