Page:The Collected Poems of Dora Sigerson Shorter.djvu/129



, brother, come down to the crags by the bay, Come down to the caves where I play; For oh! I saw on the rocks, asleep, A fair mermaid, and the slow waves creep To bear her away, away.

O brother, brother, come quick, till you laugh with me, For no mermaid so fair is she, But the little lass that I saw last night, (I hid in the shade, you stood in the light), And she weeping most bitterly.

O brother, brother, I watched her the live-long day. Saw her hair grow jewelled with spray; Once her cheek was brushed by a gull's wet wing. And a finch flew down on her hand to sing. And was not afraid to stay.

O brother, brother, will she soon awakened be? I would she might laugh now with me. She sleeps, and the world so full of sound— She's so deaf, like the dead that are under the ground, That I laugh and laugh to see.