Peacock Pie: A Book of Rhymes

De la Mare described two distinct types of imagination - although aspects might be a better term: the childlike and the boylike. It was at the border between the two that Shakespeare Dante and the rest of the great poets lay. And so we let him have his say -- The Truants Ere my heart beats too coldly and faintly To remember sad things yet be gay I would sing a brief song of the worlds little children Magic hath stolen away. The primroses scattered by April the stars of the wide Milky Way cannot outnumber the hosts of the children Magic hath stolen away. The buttercup green of the meadows The snow of the blossoming may lovelier are not than the legions of children Magic hath stolen away. The waves tossing surf in the moonbeam The albatross lone on the spray Alone know the tears wept in vain for the children Magic hath stolen away. In vain: for at hush of the evening When the stars twinkle into the grey Seems to echo the faraway calling of children Magic hath stolen away.