Poetry Archives

Close on my heart was resting
  A sunny golden head,
As the dim gray of the twilight
  Crept round with noiseless tread.

“Tell me a ‘tory, mamma,”
  The blue-eyed baby said,
“About some itty birdie
  In za itty birdie bed.

“’Bout fen oo was itty
  An’ze mens was walkin’ hay
An’ found free ittie birdies
  Wiz za muzzer don away.”

“Some other time, my darling;
  Mamma’s tired now.”
A shade of disappointment
  Swept over the baby’s brow.

The dear blue eyes grew misty;
  O, lips that lived to blame,
That kissed and whispered “sometime”—
  That “sometime” never came.

Again, the dim, gray twilight
  Creeps round with noiseless tread,
But on my heart is resting
  No sunny golden head.

No sweet voice pleads with mamma
  “Tell me a ‘tory” now,
And only death can take away
  The shadow on my brow.