To men now of her blood and race <br />England's a little garden place, <br />Dear as a woman is, and she <br />The Queen of every loyalty. <br /> <br />To dwellers 'mid the ice and snows, <br />She is their secret garden rose <br />From which that bee, their heart, sucks off <br />For the cold Winter honey enough. <br /> <br />To toilers 'mid the sultry plains, <br />Sick for her tempered suns and rains, <br />She is the thought that wets their eyes <br />And hearts with dew of Paradise. <br /> <br />Most loved of those who never knew <br />Her green o' the silk and her soft blue, <br />Her mild inviolate fields that be <br />Hedged with the sweet-briar of the sea. <br /> <br />Sweet in their dreams her Summers are, <br />Her tranquil nights of moon and star, <br />The love-songs of her nightingales; <br />A water-spring that never fails. <br /> <br />Amid their unending distances <br />Her little crowded sweetness is <br />A dream of rest, a dream of prayer, <br />With homes and children everywhere. <br /> <br />Touch her -- and they are all on fire, <br />This little land of their desire <br />Seen in a mirage far away <br />With light upon her night and day.<br /><br />Katharine Tynan<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-colonists/
