The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes — Volume 2. George MacDonald

        Ah, your eyes ask how I brook

      Doors that are not, doors to look!

      That is whither I was tending,

      And it brings me to good ending.

        Baby is the cause of this;

      Odd it seems, but so it is;—

      Baby, with her pretty prate

      Molten, half articulate,

      Full of hints, suggestions, catches,

      Broken verse, and music snatches!

      She, like seraph gone astray,

      Must be shown the homeward way;

      Plant of heaven, she, rooted lowly,

      Must put forth a blossom holy,

      Must, through culture high and steady,

      Slow unfold a gracious lady;

      She must therefore live in wonder,

      See nought common up or under;

      She the moon and stars and sea,

      Worm and butterfly and bee,

      Yea, the sparkle in a stone,

      Must with marvel look upon;

      She must love, in heaven's own blueness,

      Both the colour and the newness;

      Must each day from darkness break,

      Often often come awake,

      Never with her childhood part,

      Change the brain, but keep the heart.

        So, from lips and hands and looks,

      She must learn to honour books,

      Turn the leaves with careful fingers,

      Never lean where long she lingers;

      But when she is old enough

      She must learn the lesson rough

      That to seem is not to be,

      As to know is not to see;

      That to man or book, appearing

      Gives no title to revering;

      That a pump is not a well,

      Nor a priest an oracle:

      This to leave safe in her mind,

      I will take her and go find

      Certain no-books, dreary apes,

      Tell her they are mere mock-shapes

      No more to be honoured by her

      But be laid upon the fire;

      Book-appearance must not hinder

      Their consuming to a cinder.

        Would you see the small immortal

      One short pace within Time's portal?

      I will fetch her.—Is she white?

      Solemn? true? a light in light?

      See! is not her lily-skin

      White as whitest ermelin

      Washed in palest thinnest rose?

      Very thought of God she goes,

      Ne'er to wander, in her dance,

      Out of his love-radiance!

        But, my friend, I've rattled plenty

      To suffice for mornings twenty!

      I should never stop of course,

      Therefore stop I will perforce.—

      If I led them up, choragic,

      To reveal their nature magic,

      Twenty things, past contradiction,

      Yet would prove I spoke no fiction

      Of the room's belongings cryptic

      Read by light apocalyptic:

      There is that strange thing, glass-masked,

      With continual questions tasked,

      Ticking with untiring rock:

      It is called an eight-day clock,

      But to me the thing appears

      Busy winding up the years,

      Drawing on with coiling chain

      The epiphany again.