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ReadingWillow structured literacy program for Australian students

Children

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow·1807–1882
Lines:36Movement:Romanticism
Come to me, O ye children!For I hear you at your play,And the questions that perplexed meHave vanished quite away. Ye open the eastern windows,That look towards the sun,Where thoughts are singing swallowsAnd the brooks of morning run. In your hearts are the birds and the sunshine,In your thoughts the brooklet's flow,But in mine is the wind of AutumnAnd the first fall of the snow. Ah! what would the world be to usIf the children were no more?We should dread the desert behind usWorse than the dark before. What the leaves are to the forest,With light and air for food,Ere their sweet and tender juicesHave been hardened into wood, -- That to the world are children;Through them it feels the glowOf a brighter and sunnier climateThan reaches the trunks below. Come to me, O ye children!And whisper in my earWhat the birds and the winds are singingIn your sunny atmosphere. For what are all our contrivings,And the wisdom of our books,When compared with your caresses,And the gladness of your looks? Ye are better than all the balladsThat ever were sung or said;For ye are living poems,And all the rest are dead.