IT's slim and trim and bound in blue; Its leaves are crisp and edged with gold; Its words are simple, stalwart too; Its thoughts are tender, wise and bold. Its pages scintillate with wit; Its pathos clutches at my throat: Oh, how I love each line of it! That Little Book I Never Wrote. In dreams I see it praised and prized By all, from plowman unto peer; It's pencil-marked and memorized, It's loaned (and not returned, I fear); It's worn and torn and travel-tossed, And even dusky natives quote That classic that the world has lost, The Little Book I Never Wrote. Poor ghost! For homes you've failed to cheer, For grieving hearts uncomforted, Don't haunt me now. . . . Alas! I fear The fire of Inspiration's dead. A humdrum way I go to-night, From all I hoped and dreamed remote: Too late . . . a better man must write That Little Book I Never Wrote. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SIX TOWN ECLOGUES: SATURDAY; THE SMALL-POX by MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU A BIT OF MULL by FREDERICK HENRY HERBERT ADLER WHEN HE EMERGED by MARGARET AHO THE BOSPHORUS REVISITED by SEYMOUR GREEN WHEELER BENJAMIN HOURS OF RECREATION by LEVI BISHOP FRAGMENT by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN WOOD MAGIC by FRANCES HALLEY BROCKETT |