Wild Roses
What! Roses growing in a meadow
Where all the cattle browse?
I’d think they’d fear the very shadow
Of daddy’s big rough cows.
From Caroling Dusk (Harper & Brothers, 1927), edited by Countee Cullen. This poem is in the public domain.
I like to stand right still awhile
Beside some forest pool.
The reeds around it smell so fresh,
The waters look so cool!
Sometimes I just hop in and wade,
And have a lot of fun,
Playing with bugs that dart across
The water in the sun.
In wintertime I have such fun
When I play quoits with father.
I beat him almost every game.
He never seems to bother.
The baker’s boy delivers loaves
All up and down our street.
His car is white, his clothes are white,
White to his very feet.
I wonder if he stays that way.