IN SCHOOL-DAYS

Still sits the school-house by the road,

A ragged beggar sunning;

Around it still the sumachs grow,

And blackberry-vines are running.

***

Within, the master's desk is seen,

Deep scarred by raps official;

The warping floor, the battered seats,

The jack-knife's cared initial;

***

The charcoal frescoes on its wall;

Its door's worn sill, betraying

The feet that, creeping slow to school,

Went storming out to playing!

***

Long years ago a winter sun

Shone over it at setting;

Lit up its western window-panes,

And low eaves' icy fretting.

***

It touched the tangled golden curls,

And brown eyes full of grieving,

Of one who still her steps delay

When all the school were leaving.

***

For near her stood the little boy

Her childish favor singled;

His cap pulled low upon a face

Where pride and shame were mingled.

***

Pushing with restless feet the snow

To right and left, he lingered;

As restlessly her tiny hands

The blue-checked apron fingered.

***

He saw her lift her eyes; he felt

The soft hand's light caressing,

And heard the tremble of her voice,

As if a fault confessing.

***

"I'm sorry that I spelt the word:

I hate to go above you,

Because,"-the brown eyes lower fell.-

"Because, you see, I love you!"

***

Still memory to a gray-haired man

That sweet child-face is showing.

Dear girl! the grasses on her grave

Have forty years been growing!

***

He lives to learn, in life's hard school,

How few who pass above him

Lament their triumph and his loss,

Like her,-because they love him.

John Greenleaf Whittier