Two Songs of a Fool
A speckled cat and a tame hareEat at my hearthstoneAnd sleep there;And both look up to me aloneFor learning and defenceAs I look up to Providence.
I start out of my sleep to thinkSome day I may forgetTheir food and drink;Or, the house door left unshut,The hare may run till it's foundThe horn's sweet note and the tooth of the hound.
I bear a burden that might well tryMen that do all by rule,And what can IThat am a wandering witted foolBut pray to God that He easeMy great responsibilities.
I slept on my three-legged stool by the fire,The speckled cat slept on my knee;We never thought to enquireWhere the brown hare might be,And whether the door were shut.Who knows how she drank the windStretched up on two legs from the mat,Before she had settled her mindTo drum with her heel and to leap:Had I but awakened from sleepAnd called her name she had heard,It may be, and had not stirred,That now, it may be, has foundThe horn's sweet note and the tooth of the hound.
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