WILLIAM BLAKE

��4.86. Reeds of Innocence

PIPING down the valleys wild, Piping songs of pleasant glee, On a cloud I saw a child, And he laughing said to me:

' Pipe a song about a Lamb ! ' So I piped with merry cheer.

' Piper, pipe that song again ; ' So I piped : he wept to hear.

4 Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe ;

Sing thy songs of happy cheer ! ' So I sung the same again,

While he wept with joy to hear.

'Piper, sit thee down and write In a book that all may read/

So he vanish'd from my sight; And I pluck' d a hollow reed,

And I made a rural pen,

And I stain'd the water clear,

And I wrote my happy songs Every child may joy to hear.

��487- The Little Black

mother bore me in the southern wild, And I am black, but O, my soul is white! White as an angel is the English child, But I am black, as if bereaved of light.

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