Poetry Archives

Around my vine-wreathed portico,
At evening, there’s a perfect glow
  Of little lights a-flashing—
As if the stellar bodies had
From super-heat grown hyper-mad,
  And spend their ire in clashing.

As frisky each as shooting star,
These tiny electricians are
  The Lampyrine Linnaean—
Or lightning-bugs, that sparkling gleam
Like scintillations in a dream
  Of something empyrean.

They brush my face, light up my hair,
My garments touch, dart everywhere;
  And if I try to catch them
They’re quicker than the wicked flea—
And then I wonder how ’twould be
  To have a dress to match them.

To be a “princess in disguise,”
And wear a robe of fireflies
 All strung and wove together,
And be the cynosure of all
At Madame Haut-ton’s carnival,
  In fashion’s gayest feather.

So, sudden, falls upon the grass
The overpow’ring light of gas,
  And through the lattice streaming;
As wearily I close my eyes
Brief are the moments that suffice
  To reach the land of dreaming.

Now at the ball, superbly dressed
As I suppose, to eclipse the rest,
  Within an alcove shady
A brilliant flame I hope to be,
While all admire and envy me,
  The “bright electric lady.”

But, ah, they never shine at all!
My eyes ignite—I leave the hall,
  For wrathful tears have filled them;
I could have crushed them on the spot—
The bugs, I mean!—and quite forgot
  That stringing them had killed them.