Page:Poems Piatt.djvu/76

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IF I WERE A QUEEN.
"But if you were a Queen?" you said.
Well, then I think my favourite page
Should have a yellow, restless head,
And be just your own pretty age.
So sweet in violet velvet, he
Should tend my butterflies in herds,
Or help that belted knight, the bee,
Win honey, or make little birds
Some little songs to sing for me—
          If I were a Queen.

A Queen—you saw one sitting by
A tall man in a picture? Well
He had a harp? You need not try—
Her name is one you can not tell
And so you wonder if I could
Be Isolt, then? Not she, I fear,
To save Sir Tristram of the Wood
And all his tripping silver deer;
For it were better to be good,
          If I were a Queen.