Metrical Friday: ‘To a Child’

To a Child
By Sohpie Jewett

The leaves talked in the twilight, dear;
     Hearken the tale they told:
How in some far-off place and year,
     Before the world grew old,

I was a dreaming forest tree,
     You were a wild, sweet bird
Who sheltered at the heart of me
     Because the north wind stirred;

How, when the chiding gale was still,
     When peace fell soft on fear,
You stayed one golden hour to fill
     My dream with singing, dear.

To-night the self-same songs are sung
     The first green forest heard;
My heart and the gray world grow young—
     To shelter you, my bird.