The Tinker's Brat

I saw a beggar woman bare
Her bosom to the winter air;
And into the tender nest
Of her famished mother-breast
She laid her child,
And him beguiled,
With crooning song into his rest.

With crooning song and tender word,
About a little singing bird,
Who spread her wings about her brood,
And tore her bosom up for food,
And sang the while,
Them to beguile,
All in the forest's solitude.

And hearing this I could not see
That she was clad in misery;
For in her heart there was a glow
Warmed her bare feet in the snow:
In her heart was hid a sun
Would warm the world for every one.

The Hill of Vision [1912]