Under the Tree | Page 6

thing.
I tried to call and tried to scream,?But all my throat was shut and dry.?My little heart was jumping fast,?I couldn't talk or cry.
And when I'd look outside the bed?I'd see the panther going in.?The streaks were moving on his back,?The bubbles on his chin.
I couldn't help it if they came,?I couldn't save myself at all,?And so I only waited there?And turned my face against the wall.
THE PEOPLE
The ants are walking under the ground,?And the pigeons are flying over the steeple,?And in between are the people.
THE GRANDMOTHER
When Grandmother comes to our house,?She sits in the chair and sews away.?She cuts some pieces just alike?And makes a quilt all day.
I watch her bite the little thread,?Or stick the needle in and out,?And then she remembers her grandmother's house,?And what her grandmother told about,
And how a very long ago--?She tells it while she cuts and strips--?We used to live in Mary-land,?And there was a water with ships.
But that was long before her day,?She says, and so I like to stand?Beside her chair, and then I ask,?"Please tell about in Mary-land."
IN MARYLAND
When it was Grandmother Barbara's day,?We lived on a hill, and down below,?Beyond the pasture and the trees,?A river used to go.
The water was very wide and blue?And deep, and my! it was a sight?To see the ships go up and down,?And all the sails were white.
And Grandmother Barbara used to wait?Beside the window or the door.?She never was too tired of it?To watch the river any more.
And we could hardly see across,?And the water was blue, as blue as the sky,?And all day long and all day long?We watched the little ships go by.
THE SUNDAY BONNET
It happened at Grandmother Polly's house,?And there was a bonnet put away?For Polly to wear when she went to church.?She would not wear it every day.
It had some little flowers on,?And it was standing on its head?In a bonnet box where it was safe,?Away up stairs on the company's bed.
And Grandmother Polly was going to church,?And she sent her Alice up the stair--?Alice was black--she was Evaline's child--?She waited on Polly and combed her hair.
And Alice said, "Oh, lawsie me!"?And then she cried and came running down.?And everyone went to see, and the cat?Had five little cats in the bonnet crown.
THE SUN AND A BIRCH TREE
As I came home through Howard's lane,?The trees were bending down with rain.
A still mist went across their tops,?And my coat was powdered gray with drops.
Then I looked in the woods to see?The limbs of the white birch tree.
It made a bright spot in the air,?And I thought the sun was shining there.
A LITTLE WIND
(A Song)
When I lay down?In a clover place,?With eyelids closed,?In a clover place,?A little wind came to my face.
One gentle wind?Blew on my mouth,?And I said, "It will quiver by.?What little wind now can it be?"?And I lay still?Where the clovers were.
But when I raised my lids to see,?Then it was a butterfly.
AUTUMN FIELDS
He said his legs were stiff and sore?For he had gone some twenty-eight miles,?And he'd walked through by watergaps?And fences and gates and stiles.
He said he'd been by Logan's woods,?And up by Walton's branch and Simms,?And there were sticktights on his clothes?And little dusts of seeds and stems.
And then he sat down on the steps,?And he said the miles were on his feet.?For some of that land was tangled brush,?And some was plowed for wheat.
The rabbits were thick where he had been,?And he said he'd found some ripe papaws.?He'd rested under a white oak tree,?And for his dinner he ate red haws.
Then I sat by him on the step?To see the things that he had seen.?And I could smell the shocks and clods,?And the land where he had been.
MR. PENNYBAKER AT CHURCH
He holds his songbook very low,?And then he stretches down his face,?And Mother said, "You mustn't watch,?He's only singing bass."
He makes his voice go walking down,?Or else he hurries twice as fast?As all the rest, but even then?He finishes the song the last.
And when I see him singing there,?I wonder if he knows it all?About Leviticus and Shem?And Deuteronomy and Saul.
THE WOLVES
When Grandmother Polly had married and gone,?But before her father had given her Clem,?Or Joe, or Sandy, or Evaline--?Before he had given her any of _them_,
She used to live in a far-away place,?In a little cabin that was her home,?And all around were bushes and trees,?And the wolves could come.
At night they ran down out of the rocks?And bristled up their trembly fur.?They came and howled by Polly's door?And showed their little white teeth at her.
A BEAUTIFUL LADY
We like to listen to her dress,?It makes a whisper by her feet.?Her little pointed shoes are gray;?She hardly lets them touch the street.
Sometimes she has a crumpled fan.?Her hat is silvered on the crown.?And there are roses by the brim?That nod and tremble up