Mother Nature

GOOD, kindly Mother Nature plays
No favorites, but smiles for all
Who care to tread her pleasant ways
And listen to the song birds’ call.
The tulips and the violets grow
For all the world to gaze upon;
With beauty are the hills aglow
Not for a few, but everyone.

Her grass grows green for rich and poor,
For proud and humble, high and low;
Beside the toiler’s cottage door
Her morning glories sweetly grow.
In palace or in tenement
Her sunbeams just as gayly dance;
No special charm to one is sent,
No favored few possess her glance.

Her skies are blue for one and all,
Her flowers for every mortal bloom;
Her rains upon all creatures fall,
For all the world is her perfume.
The rich man gets no sweeter smile
Than does the ragged barefoot boy;
Yes, all who live and love the while,
May Mother Nature’s charms enjoy.

Ah, what a lesson we may learn
From kindly Mother Nature’s ways!
A smiling face we seldom turn
To strangers, when we meet their gaze.
A kindly word we seldom speak
Except unto a favored few,
And some return we often seek
For every kindly deed we do.

by Edgar Albert Guest