Barta

Wide solemn eyes that question me,
    Wee hand that pats my head—
Where only two have stroked before,
    And both of them are dead.
‘Ah, poo-ah Daddy mine,’ she says,
    With wondrous sympathy—
Oh, baby girl, you don’t know how
    You break the heart in me!
Let friends and kinsfolk work their worst,
    And the world say what it will,
Your baby arms go round my neck—
    I’m your own Daddy still!
And you kiss me and I kiss you,
    Fresh kisses frank and free—
Ah, baby girl, you don’t know how
    You break the heart in me!

I dreamed when I was good that when
    The snow showed in my hair,
A household angel in her teens
    Would flit about my chair,
To comfort me as I grew old;
    But that shall never be—
Ah, baby girl, you don’t know how
    You break the heart in me!

But one shall love me while I live
    And soothe my troubled head,
And never hear an unkind word
    Of me when I am dead.
Her eyes shall light to hear my name
    Howe’er disgraced it be—
Ah, baby girl, you don’t know how
    You help the heart in me!