Eugene Field

When our babe he goeth walking in his garden,
Around his tinkling feet the sunbeams play;
The posies they are good to him,
And bow them as they should to him,

Sweet, bide with me and let my love Be an enduring tether;
Oh, wanton not from spot to spot, But let us dwell together
You've come each morn to sip the sweets With which you found me dripping,
Yet never knew it was not dew But tears...

I say, as one who never
The wrath of a subscriber's bullet,
I pity him who has a
But has no little girl to pull it

I count my treasures o'er with care
—  The little toy my darling knew,  A little sock of faded hue,
A little lock of golden hair
Long years ago this holy time,  My little one—my all to me—  Sat robed in white upon my

Sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings,— Little blue pigeon with velvet eyes;
Sleep to the singing of mother-bird swinging— Swinging the nest where her little one lies
Away out yonder I see a star,— Silvery star with a tinkling song;<...

Sweetheart, be my sweetheart  When birds are on the wing,
When bee and bud and babbling flood  Bespeak the birth of spring,
Come, sweetheart, be my sweetheart  And wear this posy-ring
Sweetheart, be my sweetheart  In the mellow golden

Strange that the city thoroughfare, Noisy and bustling all the day,
Should with the night renounce its care, And lend itself to children's play
Oh, girls are girls, and boys are boys, And have been so since Abel's birth,
And shall b...

Full many a sinful notion  Conceived of foreign
Has come across the ocean  To harm this land of ours;
And heresies called fashions  Have modesty effaced,
And baleful, morbid passions  Corrupt our native taste

On afternoons, when baby boy has had a splendid nap,
And sits, like any monarch on his throne, in nurse's lap,
In some such wise my handkerchief I hold before my face,
And cautiously and quietly I move about the place;

Krinken was a little child,—It was summer when he smiled
Oft the hoary sea and
Stretched its white arms out to him,
Calling, "Sun-child, come to me;

I thought myself indeed secure, So fast the door, so firm the lock;
But, lo
he toddling comes to lure My parent ear with timorous knock
My heart were stone could it withstand The sweetness of my baby's plea,—That timorous, baby knoc...

O mother-my-love, if you'll give me your hand, And go where I ask you to wander,
I will lead you away to a beautiful land,— The Dreamland that's waiting out yonder
We'll walk in a sweet posie-garden out there, Where moonlight and starlig...