<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=529136" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Baby Bell</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">I</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Have you not heard the poets tell<br>How came the dainty Baby Bell<br>Into this world of ours?<br>The gates of heaven were left ajar:<br>With folded hands and dreamy eyes,<br>Wandering out of Paradise,<br>She saw this planet, like a star,<br>Hung in the glistening depths of even -<br>Its bridges, running to and fro,<br>O'er which the white-winged Angels go,<br>Bearing the holy Dead to heaven.<br>She touched a bridge of flowers - those feet,<br>So light they did not bend the bells<br>Of the celestial asphodels,<br>They fell like dew upon the flowers:<br>Then all the air grew strangely sweet.<br>And thus came dainty Baby Bell<br>Into this world of ours.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">II</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She came and brought delicious May;<br>The swallows built beneath the eaves;<br>Like sunlight, in and out the leaves<br>The robins went, the livelong day;<br>The lily swung its noiseless bell;<br>And on the porch the slender vine<br>Held out its cups of fairy wine.<br>How tenderly the twilights fell!<br>Oh, earth was full of singing-birds<br>And opening springtide flowers,<br>When the dainty Baby Bell<br>Came to this world of ours.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">III</div><div style="margin:10px 0">O Baby, dainty Baby Bell,<br>How fair she grew from day to day!<br>What woman-nature filled her eyes,<br>What poetry within them lay -<br>Those deep and tender twilight eyes,<br>So full of meaning, pure and bright<br>As if she yet stood in the light<br>Of those oped gates of Paradise.<br>And so we loved her more and more:<br>Ah, never in our hearts before<br>Was love so lovely born:<br>We felt we had a link between<br>This real world and that unseen -<br>The land beyond the morn;<br>And for the love of those dear eyes,<br>For love of her whom God led forth,<br>(The mother's being ceased on earth<br>When Baby came from Paradise,) -<br>For love of Him who smote our lives,<br>And woke the chords of joy and pain,<br>We said, Dear Christ! - our hearts bowed down<br>Like violets after rain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">IV</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And now the orchards, which were white<br>And pink with blossoms when she came,<br>Were rich in autumn's mellow prime;<br>The clustered apples burnt like flame,<br>The folded chestnut burst its shell,<br>The grapes hung purpling, range on range;<br>And time wrought just as rich a change<br>In little Baby Bell.<br>Her lissome form more perfect grew,<br>And in her features we could trace,<br>In softened curves, her mother's face.<br>Her angel-nature ripened too:<br>We thought her lovely when she came,<br>But she was holy, saintly now…<br>Around her pale angelic brow<br>We saw a slender ring of flame.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">V</div><div style="margin:10px 0">God's hand had taken away the seal<br>That held the portals of her speech;<br>And oft she said a few strange words<br>Whose meaning lay beyond our reach.<br>She never was a child to us,<br>We never held her being's key;<br>We could not teach her holy things<br>Who was Christ's self in purity.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">VI</div><div style="margin:10px 0">It came upon us by degrees,<br>We saw its shadow ere it fell -<br>The knowledge that our God had sent<br>His messenger for Baby Bell.<br>We shuddered with unlanguaged pain,<br>And all our hopes were changed to fears,<br>And all our thoughts ran into tears<br>Like sunshine into rain.<br>We cried aloud in our belief,<br>'Oh, smite us gently, gently, God!<br>Teach us to bend and kiss the rod,<br>And perfect grow through grief.'<br>Ah! how we loved her, God can tell;<br>Her heart was folded deep in ours.<br>Our hearts are broken, Baby Bell!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">VII</div><div style="margin:10px 0">At last he came, the messenger,<br>The messenger from unseen lands:<br>And what did dainty Baby Bell?<br>She only crossed her little hands,<br>She only looked more meek and fair!<br>We parted back her silken hair,<br>We wove the roses round her brow -<br>White buds, the summer's drifted snow -<br>Wrapped her from head to foot in flowers…<br>And thus went dainty Baby Bell<br>Out of this world of ours.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Thomas+Bailey+Aldrich">Thomas Bailey Aldrich</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=529136" data-title="Baby Bell de Thomas Bailey Aldrich" data-description="I Have you not heard the poets tell How came the dainty Baby Bell Into this world of ours? The gates of heaven were left ajar: With folded hands and dreamy eyes, Wandering out of Paradise, She saw this planet, like a star, Hung in the glistening ..."></div> </div> </div>

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