Classic Poem

Where is the truant? This should be the place,
Where even now we heard him laugh outright,
To greet the sun, as if he saw the face
Of some bright angel smiling in the light.

Surely the morn hath beckoned him away,
Enticing him with glory from afar:
Arise! and we may find him in his play,
Shining amid the sweetest flowers that are

His little eyes, so full of bright desires,
Could not withstand yon orient space of flowers
And he hath 'scaped the intervening briers,
The field for bleeding feet which we call ours.

It cannot be he wandered out alone;
O, rather that dear friend of many charms,
Who wooed him in each light that round us shone,
Won him at last into his careful arms.

O! look again, a little further look,
And weep no tear unless it be for joy,
Toward yon sweet field, where flower, and bird, and brook
Beguile the glad heart of our truant boy.

Look closer still, until your gaze has won
And passed the barriers overflowered with stars, —
Those morning-glories closing in the sun,
And you shall see him through the golden bars.

Watch where he goes, still making toward the light,
Our angel truant gladly nearing home,
While a deep voice from that celestial height
Bids us be calm and suffer him to come.