Page:A channel passage and other poems (IA channelpassageot00swinrich).pdf/191

177

A CLASP OF HANDS

 

I

Soft, small, and sweet as sunniest flowers

That bask in heavenly heat
When bud by bud breaks, breathes, and cowers,
Soft, small, and sweet.

A babe's hands open as to greet
The tender touch of ours
And mock with motion faint and fleet

The minutes of the new strange hours
That earth, not heaven, must mete;
Buds fragrant still from heaven's own bowers,1
Soft, small, and sweet.