* * * * * * WINNING POEM * * * * * *

Let me have it, that something I never can reach –
Let me dance in those poppies that scatter the sky!
Let me drift on those wisps of velvety peach!
Let me slide down those beams of dusty sunshine!
Let me sit on that pale arching curve of a moon!
Let me gather those stars, behind prickling pine –
And wear them on a necklace that forever I’ll keep.
And, for a pendant, what most I should like,
Is one of those bright embers, when the fire falls asleep.

Why always so high, so far out of reach –
You taunting great velvety dome of a sky?
If closer you came, I might crawl through that breach,
That fiery crack in the pearly enamel
When the hot sun sinks over a silvery sea.
And what should I find, pass’d through that red channel?
Might I slip out of the atmosphere, and down
The cold milky-way go soaring at ease?
Let me go with the wind to rustle the tree’s green gown.

Why, Nature, so allusive, so flitting and shy,
Like the soft butterfly, who flees as I near?
On some big water-lily pad let me lie
And down the quiet stream go a-floating far.
Make the clouds my kingdom, hedge, tree and all,
With a palace, all shimmering with light from the stars.
On the crest of a wave let me ride away!
Forever let me lie on a bed of rich moss,
Let me dress in the sky at the dawn of the day,
And at Nature’s bosom I ever will stay.