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
