The Stolen Child
W. B. Yeats
Where dips the rocky highland of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water-rats; there we've hid our fairy vats,
Full of berries and of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a fairy, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
Where the wave of moonlight glosses the dim grey sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses we foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances, mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight; to and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles, while the world is full of troubles
And is anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a fairy, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
Where the wandering water gushes from the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes that scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout and whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams; leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a fairy, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
Away with us he's going, the solemn-eyed;
He'll hear no more the lowing of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob round and round the oatmeal-chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a fairy, hand in hand,
From a world more full of weeping than he can understand!