To My Lady Graygown: With a Handful of Verses

“Wayside songs and meadow blossoms; nothing perfect, nothing rare;
Every poet’s ordered, garden yields a hundred flowers more fair;
Master-singers know a music richer far beyond compare.

Yet the reaper in the harvest, ’mid the burden and the heat,
Hums a half remembered ballad, finds the easy cadence sweet
Sees the very blue of heaven in the corn-bloom at his feet.”

For the Over-Lord is generous, no straight walls His love confine;
Unto few, for world-wide glory, comes the symphony divine;
Unto all, for simple pleasure, come the thoughts that sing and shine.

So to you, dear heart, I bring them: you, among the busy throng,
Walk beside me, help me, cheer me, keep the days from seeming long:
All the blossoms, all the ballads, touched by you, to you belong⁠—
  You, my flower; you, my song!