Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
Coventry Patmore. 18231896763. The Toys
MY little Son, who look’d from thoughtful eyes | |
And moved and spoke in quiet grown-up wise, | |
Having my law the seventh time disobey’d, | |
I struck him, and dismiss’d | |
With hard words and unkiss’d, | 5 |
—His Mother, who was patient, being dead. | |
Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleep, | |
I visited his bed, | |
But found him slumbering deep, | |
With darken’d eyelids, and their lashes yet | 10 |
From his late sobbing wet. | |
And I, with moan, | |
Kissing away his tears, left others of my own; | |
For, on a table drawn beside his head, | |
He had put, within his reach, | 15 |
A box of counters and a red-vein’d stone, | |
A piece of glass abraded by the beach, | |
And six or seven shells, | |
A bottle with bluebells, | |
And two French copper coins, ranged there with careful art, | 20 |
To comfort his sad heart. | |
So when that night I pray’d | |
To God, I wept, and said: | |
Ah, when at last we lie with trancèd breath, | |
Not vexing Thee in death, | 25 |
And Thou rememberest of what toys | |
We made our joys, | |
How weakly understood | |
Thy great commanded good, | |
Then, fatherly not less | 30 |
Than I whom Thou hast moulded from the clay, | |
Thou’lt leave Thy wrath, and say, | |
‘I will be sorry for their childishness.’ |