Smallest of sparrows I have seen thee!
Though you hid from all I have caught thee!
No, not with grasping hands in which thou would perish,
But in the undulating ether of persistent memory
Where your tiny form a great comfort warrants
For eyes grieved and senses dulled of a winter to yet to come,
When time turns a tyrant and a forager of fresh leaves
bare my naked head and broken dreams.
In that day and hour, O littlest of friend,
I will think on thee, an old man, and the youth
That saw that thou were so little, oh so little!
