THE lilies in my garden grow, <br />Wide meadows ring my garden round, <br />In that green copse wild violets blow, <br />And pale, frail cuckoo flowers are found. <br />For all you see and all you hear, <br />The city might be miles away, <br />And yet you feel the city near <br />Through all the quiet of the day. <br /> <br /> <br />Sweet smells the earth--wet with sweet rain-- <br />Sweet lilac waves in moonlight pale, <br />And from the wood beyond the lane <br />I hear the hidden nightingale. <br />Though field and wood about me lie, <br />Hushed soft in dew and deep delight, <br />Yet can I hear the city's sigh <br />Through all the silence of the night. <br /> <br /> <br />For me the skylark builds and sings, <br />For me the vine her garland weaves; <br />The swallow folds her glossy wings <br />To build beneath my cottage eaves. <br />But I can feel the giant near, <br />Can hear his slaves by daylight weep, <br />And when at last the night is here, <br />I hear him moaning in his sleep. <br /> <br /> <br />Oh! for a little space of ground, <br />Though not a flower should make it gay, <br />Where miles of meadows wrapped me round, <br />And leagues and leagues of silence lay. <br />Oh! for a wind-lashed, treeless down, <br />A black night and a rising sea, <br />And never a thought of London town, <br />To steal the world's delight from me.<br /><br />Edith Nesbit<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/chains-invisible/
