Page:A treasury of war poetry, British and American poems of the world war, 1914-1919.djvu/308

 308

For there's a little wood I know

Where all the trees of wonder grow,

And shadows like cool waters flow

'Twixt ivied banks on beds of moss,—

Mingle and merge and fade and cross.

And you may come and you may go

And never in that holy place

Look upon a German face.

The trees have all grown as they will

In the wood by Highgate on the Hill:

Great oaks with many a lichen sash

And elm and birch, and may and ash,

In twos and threes they stand together

In all the splendid autumn weather.

And in between and left and right

Are laurel bushes green and bright,

Acorns and chestnuts patter down

On leaves all gold and red and brown,

All gold and red and brown and grey,

That dance the afternoon away.

October's quick and golden rains

Wander in rivers down the lanes,

Or make, in hollows, little ponds

Where pebbles shine like diamonds.

From breakfast-time till after tea

In ev'ry branch of ev'ry tree

The starlings, like a lot of boys,

For love of life make heaps of noise:

Such noise,—there is no gladder sound

In all the glad year's tuneful round;

Such placid anger, peaceful rage—

What actors on what airy stage,

What comedy for what a wage!

Children and birds and autumn trees,—

The world were well content with these.

When bloody William and his son

Are safely dead at last, and one