Clover Perfume

There’s a thrilling, tugging feeling

    On each heartstring that I know,

There’s a perfume in my nostrils

    From the fields of long ago,

There’s a vision in my memory

    Making all the world grow dim,

Taking me away back yonder

    Where "us fellows" used to swim.

 

And the vision’s central picture

    Is a laughing, blue-eyed maid

Standing in the rippling shadows

    Where we used to go to wade;

I can see her pink toes gleaming

    In the rippling stream where she,

With her skirts held safe from wetting,

    Laughs across the years to me.

 

I can see the trees we climbed in,

    I can see the streams we fished,

I can see the log we sat on

    In those old days, when we wished

That we two were grown-up people,

    Gone out in the world and far;

Now, the greatest grief that haunts me

    Is the knowing that we are.

 

I would rather be back yonder,

    Back ‘neath childhood’s skies of blue,

Than to count my wealth in millions;

    If I could go dancing through

That wee stream we loved to wade in,

    Climb the trees we used to climb,

I would never wish to grow up;

    I’d be happy all the time.

 

Comes the thrill along my heartstrings

    When the clover is in bloom;

Then my nostrils catch the far-blown,

    Tantalizing, sweet perfume

From the fields I used to romp in,

    And I hear a lilt of glee,

And a maid, bare-footed, blue-eyed,

    Laughs across the years to me.

 

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