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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
TREASURE TROVE, by CORINNE HUNTINGTON JACKSON
First Line: Today, three children passed my house
Last Line: "from an old elm tree?"
Subject(s): Children; Treasures; Childhood
First Line: Today, three children passed my house
Last Line: "from an old elm tree?"
Subject(s): Children; Treasures; Childhood
Today, three children passed my house
With boxes, tight-clasped in arms, too short
To reach about the boxes' width. In them was treasure—
Some glistening quartz, a flattened penny,
Flint, arrowheads, and pebbles washed round
By river power. They meant to bury them,
As pirates, so they said.
Long forgetful, I remembered other treasure—
Three cloth brownies, buried in another land and time.
Brownies where are you? Seth and I gave you pirate burial
Twenty—ah no—thirty years ago at Belmond.
And all the years we hunted you thereafter,
Our treasure chart lost,
Did you feel neglected in your long grass covered cell?
Truly, we searched for you each spring—
Children, all unaware of laws of decay and death—
Our hopes ran high.
(We've learned those laws since—God knows—each of us.)
Three quaint rag brownies,
Where are you?
Shall one day my children or theirs, find your ghosts
"So many steps this way or that
From an old elm tree?"
Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!
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CHILDREN SELECTING BOOKS IN A LIBRARY by RANDALL JARRELL
COME TO THE STONE ... by RANDALL JARRELL
THE LOST WORLD by RANDALL JARRELL
A SICK CHILD by RANDALL JARRELL
CONTINENT'S END by ROBINSON JEFFERS
ON THE DEATH OF FRIENDS IN CHILDHOOD by DONALD JUSTICE
THE POET AT SEVEN by DONALD JUSTICE
DIVERSITY OF CREATURES by CORINNE HUNTINGTON JACKSON