Joy came in youth as a humming-bird,
        (Sing hey! for the honey and bloom of life!)
    And it made a home in my summer bower
    With the honeysuckle and the sweet-pea flower.
        (Sing hey! for the blossoms and sweets of life!)

    Joy came as a lark when the years had gone,
        (Ah! hush, hush still, for the dream is short!)
    And I gazed far up to the melting blue
    Where the rare song dropped like a golden dew.
        (Ah! sweet is the song tho' the dream be short!)

    Joy hovers now in a far-off mist,
        (The night draws on and the air breathes snow!)
    And I reach, sometimes, with a trembling hand
    To the red-tipped cloud of the joy-bird's land.
        (Alas! for the days of the storm and the snow!)

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