Page:Poems Cook.djvu/403

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THEY ALL BELONG TO ME.
There's the thick and dingled cover
Where the hare and pheasant play,
There are sheets of rosy clover,
There are hedges crown'd with May;
There are vines all dark and gushing,
There are orchards ripe and red,
There are herds of wild deer crushing
The heath-bells as they tread.
And ye, who count in money
The value these may be,
Your hives but hold my honey,
For "they all belong to me."

Ye cannot shut the tree in,
Ye cannot hide the hills,
Ye cannot wall the sea in,
Ye cannot choke, the rills;
The corn will only nestle
In the broad arms of the sky,
The clover crop must wrestle
With the common wind, or die.
And while these stores of treasure
Are spread where I may see,
By God's high, bounteous pleasure,
"They all belong to me."

What care I for the profit
The stricken stem may yield?
I have the shadow of it
While upright in the field.
What reck I of the riches
The mill-stream gathers fast,
While I bask in shady niches,
And see the brook go past?

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