Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, HAPPY-GO-LUCKY, by EMILY HENRIETTA HICKEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

HAPPY-GO-LUCKY, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Happy-go-lucky, you darling, and is it
Last Line: Which mary has nurtured for jesus, and one day will give him to wear.
Subject(s): Contentment; Music & Musicians


HAPPY-GO-LUCKY, you darling, and is it yourself come at last?
We thought how the spring was delaying, the winter would never be past!
But Happy-go-lucky is here, and with her the breathing of spring,
And the earth has awoken from sleep, and the birds are beginning to sing.

Oh, God made the sun for the day, and God made the moon for the night,
And God has made Happy-go-lucky to give us dear joyaunce and light—
It's Happy-go-lucky they call you because you are always content
As to whether the guineas are coming, or whether the guineas are spent.

It's Happy-go-lucky they call you because they are sure you can do
With an outside unhandsome if only the inside be lovely and true:
For, under the tarnished and ugly, and under the sordid and mean,
You see with the eyes of the spirit the fair and the good and the clean.

The hour that I looked on you first, my beautiful lady, you trod
With sweet, serene joy of a soul just fresh from the blessing of God,
As you left the old priest and drew nigh to the shrine of the Heart of the Lord,

And you knelt, and I knelt, in the silence, and loved Him, and praised, and
adored.

The next time I saw you, my dear, you were dancing. O young and O sweet,
And O happy, the joy of your heart was the rippling delight of your feet;
Your body made loveliest rhythm, gold-girdled, pearl-necklaced,
white-clad;—
And the next time I saw you, you sat by a sick-bed your presence made glad.

You loosened your tongue's dearest music, and, oh! to that music there clung
A taste of the brogue that was making your English so sweet on the tongue:
Your words were the exquisite garb of your exquisite feeling and thought,
And the hospital ward was an Eden where sorrow and pain were as nought.

Right glad be our hearts and rejoicing because of His goodness who chose
This garden of ours to make lovely with odour and bloom of a rose,
This rose of His Paradise earthly, in beauty exceedingly fair,
Which Mary has nurtured for Jesus, and one day will give Him to wear.





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