LITMIR.BIZ

      O reader! hast thou ever stood to see

      The Holly tree?

      The eye that contemplates it, well perceives

      Its glossy leaves,

      Ordered by an intelligence so wise

      As might confound the atheist's sophistries.

      Below a circling fence its leaves are seen

      Wrinkled and keen;

      No grazing cattle through their prickly round

      Can reach to wound;

      But as they grow where nothing is to fear,

      Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear.

      I love to view these things with curious eyes,

      And moralize;

      And in this wisdom of the Holly tree

      Can emblem see

      Wherewith perchance to make a pleasant rhyme,

      One which may profit in the after-time.

      Thus, though abroad perchance I might appear

      Harsh and austere,

      To those who on my leisure would intrude

      Reserved and rude,

      Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be

      Like the high leaves upon the Holly tree.

      And should my youth, as youth is apt, I know,

      Some harshness show,

      All vain asperities I day by day

      Would wear away,

      Till the smooth temper of my age should be

      Like the high leaves upon the Holly tree.

      And as when all the summer trees are seen

      So bright and green,

      The Holly leaves a sober hue display

      Less bright than they,

      But when the bare and wintry woods we see,

      What then so cheerful as the Holly tree?