Loveliness Of Baby
A baby’s hands, like rose-buds furled,
Whence yet no leaf expands,
Ope if you touch, though dose upcurled,
A baby’s hands.
Then, even as warriors grip their brands
When battle’s bolt is hurled,
They close, denched hard like tightening bands.
No rosebuds yet by dawn impearled
Match, even in loveliest lands,
The sweetest flower in all the world—
A baby’s hands.
A baby’s eyes, ere speech begin,
Ere lips learn words or sighs,
Bless all things bright enough to win
A baby’s eyes.
Love, while the sweet thing laughs and lies,
And sleep flows out and in,
Lies perfect in their paradise.
Their glance might cast out pain and sin,
Their speech make dumb the wise;
By mute glad godlife felt within
A baby’s eyes.
—A. C. Swinburne.
O Ye Children
Come to me, O ye children!
For I hear you at your play,
And the questions that perplex me
Have vanished quite away.
Ye are better than all the ballads,
That ever were sung or said;
For ye are living poems,
And all the rest are dead.
—Henry W. Longfellow.
Alternate Reading: II Peter 2: 9-22.