Sixteen - A poem by A. A. B. Cavaness

Sixteen.

BUT just in life's enchanted morning,
Fairest of all the town's adorning;

Her smile is like the radiant spring
when Nature's sweets are blossoming;

Dancing from April into May,
Ideal of their brightest day;

Untouched of any darker power,
Ideal of their fairest flower;

The heart, the voice responsive chimes
The music of the poet's rhymes;

In cloudless eyes the crescent sign
Of soul to sparkle as the wine;

Expectant at the rosiest gate
Of all that for her footsteps wait,

The matchless tableau of the bud
Flowering to fairest womanhood!

O sunshine, wrap her with your gold,
That youth be won ere she be old]

0 hearts anear, instill secure
The precious wisdom of the pure!

That life from loftiest eminence
Flame heavenward in sweet incense.

^__A. A. B. Cavaness.

Poems by Two Brothers
A. A. B. Cavaness & J. M. Cavaness
(Chetopa: J. M. Cavaness and Son. 1896)
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