Edith Nesbit Poems

KATE is like a violet, Gertrude's like a rose,
Jane is like a gillyflower smart;
But Laura's like a lily, the purest bud that blows,
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SPRING, pretty Spring, what treasure do you bring to me?
Green grass and buttercups, cherry-bloom and may?
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Does the wind sing in your ears at night, in the town,
Rattling the windows and doors of the cheap-built place?
Do you hear its song as it flies over marsh and down?
Do you feel the kiss that the wind leaves here on my face?
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THERE is a grey-walled garden, far away
From noise and smoke of cities, where the hours
Pass with soft wings among the happy flowers,
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IF we must part, this parting is the best:
How would you bear to lay
Your head on some warm pillow far away--
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ARE you going for a soldier with your curly yellow hair,
And a scarlet coat instead of the smock you used to wear?
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KNOWING our needs, hardly knowing our powers,
Hear how we cry to you, brothers of ours!--
Brothers in nature, pulse, passions, and pains,
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1 The garden mould was damp and chill,
2 Winter had had his brutal will
3 Since over all the year's content
4 His devastating legions went.
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LET Summer go
To other gardens; here we have no need of her.
She smiles and beckons, but we take no heed of her,
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Now the Spring is waking,
Very shy as yet,
Busy mending, making
Grass and violet.
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