Given, not Hired
By Ethel Lynn.
- We hired the roof above our heads,
- And walls to gird us round,
- The garden walk, the drooping vine,
- The rose and blossom mound;
- But oh, that streak of sunset sky
- Between the budding trees,
- The moonlight on the little porch,
- Who shall we pay for these?
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- We have musicians too, all day,
- Whose flutes we did not bring;
- An oriole trills all the while,
- And saucy robins sing;
- While in the bush or evergreen
- A cat-bird, gray and shy,
- A solo gives. Who pays the birds
- For all these songs? Not I.
-
- Just when the twilight turns to dusk,
- And reveries are sweet,
- A piping voice, exceeding small,
- Sounds by lay idle feet,
- And birds me listen to its tale
- Of home and household fire
- Our cricket, that we did not bring,
- The song we did not hire.
-
- The summer wind that lifts the leaves
- Then whispers soft and low,
- How roses and syringas bloom,
- How sweet acacias blow,
- With memories of childless hours
- In garden pathways sweet,
- Who sends the southwind to my door,
- With soft unshodden feet!
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- Nay, these are gifts one cannot buy,
- Not pay in market gold;
- One debt uncancelled evermore
- When cycles shall have rolled,
- So, lifting up a thankful heart
- To God, Who gives, I cry;
- "Thou knowest, Lord, I cannot pay
- For all these things: not I."
June 30, 1871. McConnelsville South-eastern Independent 1(13): 1.