The sweetest poem that ever was writ--
Do you not know it?--is 'We are seven;'
For the dear little girl who talks in it,
Will not give up her brothers in Heaven.

What the stupid sense of the grown-up man
Urges, she cannot perceive; but prefers
The simple faith of her own sweet plan,
And the brothers in Heaven still are hers.

The very last day that Harry was here
I read him those verses, and Harry smil'd;
And we held some converse, divinely dear,
Which was all about that dear little child.

Is it for this that I think of it now?
Is it for this he let seven words fall?
O pulses are beating behind my brow,
And I think my heart is not beating at all!
And my brain, it keeps whirling round and round,
Like a sing-song wheel through a ship at night;
And the seven words that constantly sound
Are 'you shall follow me, sweet,' and 'I'll write.'




I wonder if I have been going mad,
In the strange wild world I am living in?