TO A CHILD.
Reading edition
You little madonna, so very demure!
You draw me, yet awe me: As warning, half scorning,
That kissing a face so religiously pure Is almost a sacrilege, I may be sure.
Yet, awed as I am, I but love you the more.
You meet me and greet me Serenely and queenly;
And image so sweetly the one I adore When She was a child in the ages of yore.
Her name it is Mary Regina—your own.
You share it and wear it As flower its dower
Of fragrance—predestined hereafter, full-blown, To reign with the lilies that circle Her throne.
Be fragrant for me, then, O lily! and pray—
Each hour, little flower, Exhaling availing
Petitions—to Mary the Queen of your May, To breathe on my Autumn your pureness to-day.