O LITTLE FAIRIES . . . O LITTLE fairies, under your long, long hair Ye sang to me so sweetly in my sleep, O little fairies, under your long, long hair, In the charmed forest of enchantment deep. Mid the charmed forest's rites of mystery, Compassionate gnomes, while I was sleeping there, Offered with kind and honest hands to me Even while I slept, a sceptre gold and fair. I have learned since that all is false and vain: The golden sceptre and the forest lay, But like a fretful, credulous child I fain Would in that forest sleep my life away. What matter that I know it false and vain . . . |