Due to busyness, I missed the children’s hour post last Friday. Here I make up for it!

An Apple-Howling Song

Here’s to thee, old apple tree,
Whence thou may’st bud, and whence thou may’st blow,
And whence thou may’st bear apples enow!
Hats full! Caps full!
Bushel-bushel-sacks full,
Old parson’s breeches full,
And my pockets full too!
Huzza!
~Old English

The Swing

How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
Rivers and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside-

Till I look down on the garden green;
Down on the roof so brown-
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!
~Robert Louis Stevenson

A London Clock

“Bell horses, bell horses,
What time of day?”
“One o’clock, two o’clock,
Three and away.”
~Old Chapbook

October

Lo, sweetened with the summer light,
The full juiced apple, waxing over-mellow
Drops in a silent autumn night.
~Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Garden Song

I wonder where I may gather some sweet pretty flowers.
Whom shall I ask?
Suppose that I ask the brilliant humming bird,
suppose that I ask the yellow butterfly!
They will tell me.
They led me within a valley to a fertile spot where
the dew spread out in glittering splendor,
where I saw lovely fragrant flowers, lovely
odorous flowers clothed with the dew.
I wanted to sing.
I polished my song like a shining emerald.
I arranged it like the voice of a bird.
I set it in order like the bird’s chant.
I mingled it with the beauty of the emerald that I
might make it appear like a flower bursting its bud.
~Maya Folk Lore

A Hint to the Wise

I know a little garden path
That leads you through the trees,
Past flower-beds and hollyhocks
And by the homes of bees,
Until at last it brings you to
A little fountain bath
Where tiny birds bay wash themselves,
If you go down that path,
Remember to be careful what
You say. A little bird
May cause a deal of trouble by
Repeating what he’s heard.
~Pringle Barret