A Child's Garden of Verses
A Child's Garden of Verses
Stevenson wrote these poems from inside a child's mind, not looking in from outside, and that makes all the difference. Here are sixty-four small verses about climbing cherry trees to see foreign lands, sailing boats down streams, waiting for the lamplighter to come home, and making worlds out of bedsheets. But there's a ache underneath the joy, a bittersweet knowledge that these moments are passing even as they're happening. 'The Land of Counterpane' captures the kingdom a child builds from pillows, 'My Shadow' wonders at the strange companion who grows and shrinks. These aren't poems about childhood nostalgia written by an adult looking back; they're poems written by a man who remembered what it actually felt like to be small, to be afraid of the dark, to long for adventures, to love home. The world of a child is both magnificent and fragile, and Stevenson understood that perfectly. This is the book adults read to children and then quietly keep reading after the little ones fall asleep, because it reminds them of something they've lost and can almost, almost touch again.
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“The world is so full of a number of things, I ’m sure we should all be as happy as kings.””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“The rain is falling all around,It falls on field and tree,It rains on the umbrellas here,And on the ships at sea.””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“In winter I get up at night,and dress by yellow candlelight,In summer, quite the other day,I have to go to bed by day””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“To My MotherYou too, my mother, read my rhymesFor love of unforgotten times,And you may chance to hear once moreThe little feet along the floor.””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“Time which none can bind,While flowing fast away, leaves love behind.””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“All by myself I have to go, With none to tell me what to do”
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“How do you like to go up in a swing,Up in the air so blue?Oh, I do think it is the pleasantest thingEver a child can do!””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“Time to Rise A birdie with a yellow bill Hopped upon my window sill, Cocked his shining eye and said: "Ain't you 'shamed, you sleepy-head!””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
“Try as I like to find the way, I never can get back by day, Nor can remember plain and clear The curious music that I hear.””
— Robert Louis Stevenson
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<a href="https://lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33"><img src="https://lex-books.com/badges/read-on-lex.svg" alt="Read A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson free on Lex" width="160" height="40"></a>[](https://lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33)[url=https://lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33][img]https://lex-books.com/badges/read-on-lex.svg[/img][/url]Read A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson free on Lex: https://lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33Cite this book
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Stevenson, Robert Louis. A Child's Garden of Verses. Lex, lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33.Stevenson, R. L. (n.d.). A Child's Garden of Verses. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33Stevenson, Robert Louis. A Child's Garden of Verses. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/a-child-s-garden-of-verses-1791e88e-d5e6-4fc5-a336-c08e42919f33.
