Bells for John White Side's Girl Child

 There was such speed in her sweet small frame,
 And she with such grace her feet let fall,
 Who now can ask why to see her thus tamed
 Makes such fools of us all.

 In our high rooms, of her wars much was made.
 We looked at the fruit trees and past them there
 Where she took arms and fought her own shade,
 Or chased hard to the mere

 The slow sly geese, like a snow cloud,
 Drip drip went their snow on the green lea,
 With trick, starts and stops, sleep filled and proud,
 Who cried in goose, Ah me!

 For the ne'er stopt heart held in that small
 Girl child with rod that made them rise
 From their noon dreams of luxe and all,
 and run, still geese, 'neath the skies!

 But now go the bells, and here now we stand,
 In one house so stern we are stopped,
 To say we are vex'd at her brown hands,
 Which lie there prim and propped.

                                -- John Crow Ran Some
                                   (by Rich Hort)

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