| Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900. |
| |
| 1687. Does the Pearl Know? |
| | | By Helen Hay |
| |
| |
| DOES the pearl know, that in its shade and sheen, | |
| The dreamy rose and tender wavering green, | |
| Are hid the hearts of all the ranging seas, | |
| That Beauty weeps for gifts as fair as these? | |
| Does it desire aught else when its rare blush | 5 |
| Reflects Aurora in the morning’s hush, | |
| Encircling all perfection can bestow, | |
| Does the pearl know? | |
| |
| Does the bird know, when, through the waking dawn, | |
| He soaring sees below the silvered lawn, | 10 |
| And weary men who wait to watch the day | |
| Steal o’er the heights where he may wheel and stray? | |
| Can he conceive his fee divine to share, | |
| As a free, joyous peer with sun and air, | |
| And pity the sad things that creep below, | 15 |
| Does the bird know? | |
| |
| Does the heart know, when, filled to utter brim, | |
| The least quick throb, a sacrificial hymn | |
| To a great god who scorns the frown of Jove, | |
| That here it finds the awful power of love? | 20 |
| Think you the new-born babe in first wise sleep | |
| Fathoms the gift the heavens have bade him keep? | |
| Yet if this be—if all these things are so— | |
| Does the heart know? | |
| |
|
|
|
