THE GRASS IN MADISON SQUARE

The pleasant turf is dried and marred and seared, The grass is dead. No soft green shoot, by rain and sunshine reared, Lifts up its head. I think the grass that made the park so gay In early spring Now decks the lawns of Heaven where babies play And dance and sing. And poor old vagabonds who now have left The dusty street, Find fields of which they were in life bereft, Beneath their feet.