Ho, Giant! This is I! I have built me a bean-stalk into your sky! La,—but it's lovely, up so high! This is how I came,—I put Here my knee, there my foot, Up and up, from shoot to shoot— And the blessed bean-stalk thinning Like the mischief all the time, Till it took me rocking, spinning, In a dizzy, sunny circle, Making angles with the root, Far and out above the cackle Of the city I was born in, Till the little dirty city In the light so sheer and sunny Shone as dazzling bright and pretty As the money that you find In a dream of finding money— What a wind ! What a morning!— Till the tiny, shiny city, When I shot a glance below, Shaken with a giddy laughter, Sick and blissfully afraid, Was a dew-drop on a blade, And a pair of moments after Was the whirling guess I made,— And the wind was like a whip Cracking past my icy ears, And my hair stood out behind, And my eyes were full of tears, Wide-open and cold, More tears than they could hold, The wind was blowing so, And my teeth were in a row, Dry and grinning, And I felt my foot slip, And I scratched the wind and whined, And I clutched the stalk and jabbered, With my eyes shut blind,— What a wind ! What a wind! Your broad sky, Giant, Is the shelf of a cupboard; I make bean-stalks, I'm A builder, like yourself, But bean-stalks is my trade, I couldn't make a shelf, Don't know how they're made, Now, a bean-stalk is more pliant— La, what a climb! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...DOMESDAY BOOK: REV. PERCY FERGUSON by EDGAR LEE MASTERS UPON THE NIPPLES OF JULIA'S BREAST by ROBERT HERRICK WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL MAPLE LEAVES by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH THALIA by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH THE GODODDIN: CONAN by ANEIRIN TO GEORGE CRUIKSHANK, ESQ., ON SEEING HIS PICTURE ... by MATTHEW ARNOLD |