Babyhood.

Heigh-ho! Babyhood! Tell me where you linger:
    Let's toddle home again, for we have gone astray;
Take this eager hand of mine and lead me by the finger
    Back to the Lotus lands of the far-away.

Turn back the leaves of life; don't read the story, -
    Let's find the pictures, and fancy all the rest: -
We can fill the written pages with a brighter glory
    Than Old Time, the story-teller, at his very best!

Turn to the brook, where the honeysuckle, tipping
    O'er its vase of perfume spills it on the breeze,
And the bee and humming-bird in ecstacy are sipping
    From the fairy flagons of the blooming locust trees.

Turn to the lane, where we used to "teeter-totter,"
    Printing little foot-palms in the mellow mold,
Laughing at the lazy cattle wading in the water
    Where the ripples dimple round the buttercups of gold:

Where the dusky turtle lies basking on the gravel
    Of the sunny sandbar in the middle-tide,
And the ghostly dragonfly pauses in his travel
    To rest like a blossom where the water-lily died.

Heigh-ho! Babyhood! Tell me where you linger:
    Let's toddle home again, for we have gone astray;
Take this eager hand of mine and lead me by the finger
    Back to the Lotus lands of the far-away.