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“BUT—LET ME THINK.”

I’p like to be a tiny bird, a tiny bird, a tiny bird,

With wings of red or wings of blue, flying about from tree to tree;
I'd sing the very sweetest song was ever heard, was ever heard,

And all the other birds should come to learn that song of me.

Or else I’d like to be a flow’r, a pretty flow’r, a pretty flow’r,
A cunning pansy or a pink, a wild rose or a daisy white;

I'd swing and dance with every show’r, with every show’r, with every show’r
That brought me sparkling drops of rain to make me sweet and bright.

Or I would be a merry brook, a merry brook, a merry brook

Running through meadows green, with skies as blue as violets overhead,
And grasses tall that bent to look, that bent to look, that bent to look

At me, and wondered greatly when they saw themselves instead.

But — let me think — would I? No, no, I wouldn’t be, I wouldn’t be
A tiny bird, or brook, or flow’r; for I can sing, and I can play,

And I can swing, and dance and see, and dance and see, and dance and see
The grass, the sky, the field and all around as well as they.

And they have no mamma to kiss, mamma to kiss, mamma to kiss,
And no papa to love, nor yet an aunt to call them “ pet” and “joy;”
And so ’tis better far, I think, to stay like this, to stay like this,
And be a happy little child — a curly-headed boy.
MarGaReET EyTINGE,