JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY
Reading edition
WITH LIFE PICTURES BY WILLIAM B. DYER
NEW YORK GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1883, 1887, 1888, 1890, 1891, 1892, 1894, 1897, 1898, 1901, 1905
by
James Whitcomb Riley
INSCRIBED
To the Elect of Love,—or side-by-side In raptest ecstasy, or sundered wide By seas that bear no message to or fro Between the loved and lost of long ago.
So were I but a minstrel, deft At weaving, with the trembling strings Of my glad harp, the warp and weft Of rondels such as rapture sings,— I'd loop my lyre across my breast, Nor stay me till my knee found rest In midnight banks of bud and flower Beneath my lady's lattice-bower. And there, drenched with the teary dews, I'd woo her with such wondrous art As well might stanch the songs that ooze Out of the mockbird's breaking heart; So light, so tender, and so sweet Should be the words I would repeat, Her casement, on my gradual sight, Would blossom as a lily might.