  I’M glad I was always so good to her; I was just up there in the nursery Picking up things—you know—that were Left strewn about as carelessly As a child will do when she’s called from play; I picked them up with a mist and blur In my eyes, and I laid them all away— I’m glad I was always so good to her. And many’s the picture that came to me, That came to me o’er a Teddy bear Or a doll or a whole tin infantry Arrayed in a battle column there; Picture on picture of girls and girls (One year and two years and three) that were; Of pinafores and blue frocks and curls— I’m glad I was always so good to her. Dreams on dreams and they ride me down, Column and phalanx, and voices call; And grasses grow green and come sere and brown, And leaves bud, blossom and blow and fall; She had been six now—and seven—and ten— So tall—and so tall—how fair they were, How fair they were and they would have been, Those lost ones—I’m glad I was good to her. |
|
