Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, HIDE AND SEEK, by ALICE CARY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

HIDE AND SEEK, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: As I sit and watch at the window-pane
Last Line: As I waited them below.
Subject(s): Mortality; Childhood Memories; Farm Life; Play


AS I sit and watch at the window-pane
The light in the sunset skies,
The pictures rise in my heart and brain,
As the stars do in the skies.

Among the rest, doth rise and pass,
With the blue smoke curling o'er,
The house I was born in, with the grass
And roses round the door.

I see the well-sweep, rough and brown,
And I hear the creaking tell
Of the bucket going up and down
On the stony sides of the well.

I see the cows, by the water-side --
Red Lily, and Pink, and Star, --
And the oxen with their horns so wide,
Close locked in playful war.

I see the field where the mowers stand
In the clover-flowers, knee-deep;
And the one with his head upon his hand,
In the locust-shade asleep.

I see beneath his shady brim,
The heavy eyelids sealed,
And the mowers stopping to look at him,
As they mow across the field.

I hear the bluebird's twit-te-tweet!
And the robin's whistle blithe;
And then I see him spring to his feet,
And take up his shining scythe.

I see the barn with the door swung out, --
Still dark with its mildew streak, --
And the stacks, and the bushes all about,
Where we played at Hide and Seek!

I see and count the rafters o'er,
'Neath which the swallow sails,
And I see the sheaves on the threshing-floor,
And the threshers with the flails.

I hear the merry shout and laugh
Of the careless boys and girls,
As the wind-mill drops the golden chaff,
Like sunshine in their curls.

The shadow of all the years that stand
'Twixt me and my childhood's day,
I strip like a glove from off my hand,
And am there with the rest at play.

Out there, half hid in its leafy screen,
I can see a rose-red cheek,
And up in the hay-mow I catch the sheen
Of the darling head I seek.

Just where that whoop was smothered low,
I have seen the branches stir;
It is there that Margaret hides, I know,
And away I chase for her!

And now with curls that toss so wide
They shade his eyes like a brim,
Runs Dick for a safer place to hide,
And I turn and chase for him!

And rounding close by the jutting stack,
Where it hangs in a rustling sheet,
In spite of the body that presses back,
I espy two tell-tale feet!

Now all at once with a reckless shout,
Alphonse from his covert springs,
And whizzes by, with his elbows out,
Like a pair of sturdy wings.

Then Charley leaps from the cattle-rack,
And spins at so wild a pace,
The grass seems fairly swimming back
As he shouts, "I am home! Base! Base!"

While modest Mary, shy as a nun,
Keeps close by the grape-vine wall,
And waits, and waits, till our game is done,
And never is found at all.

But suddenly, at my crimson pane,
The lights grow dim and die,
And the pictures fade from heart and brain,
As the stars do from the sky.

The bundles slide from the threshing-floor,
And the mill no longer whirls,
And I find my playmates now no more
By their shining cheeks and curls.

I call them far, and I call them wide,
From the prairie, and over the sea,
"Oh why do you tarry, and where do you hide?"
But they may not answer me.

God grant that when the sunset sky
Of my life shall cease to glow,
I may find them waiting me on high,
As I waited them below.





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