Part 2 — A TRAGEDY
Reading edition
Among his books he sits all day To think and read and write; He does not smell the new-mown hay, The roses red and white.
I walk among them all alone, His silly, stupid wife; The world seems tasteless, dead and done— An empty thing is life.
At night his window casts a square Of light upon the lawn; I sometimes walk and watch it there Until the chill of dawn.
I have no brain to understand The books he loves to read; I only have a heart and hand He does not seem to need.
He calls me "Child"—lays on my hair Thin fingers, cold and mild; Oh! God of Love, who answers prayer, I wish I were a child!
And no one sees and no one knows (He least would know or see), That ere Love gathers next year's rose Death will have gathered me.
Edith Nesbit [1858-1924]