J. M. Barrie

The briny tears unbidden start,

At mention of my hero's name!

Was ever set so huge a heart

Within so small a frame?

So much of tenderness and grace

Confined in such a slender space?

( O tiniest of tiny men!

So wise, so whimsical, so witty!

Whose magic little fairy-pen

Is steeped in human pity;

Whose humour plays so quaint a tune,

From Peter Pan to Pantaloon! )

So wide a sympathy has he,

Such kindliness without an end,

That children clamber on his knee,

And claim him as a friend;

They somehow know he understands,

And does n't mind their sticky hands.

And so they swarm about his neck,

With energy that nothing wearies,

Assured that he will never check

Their ceaseless flow of queries,

And grateful, with a warm affection,

For his avuncular protection.

And when his watch he opens wide,

Or beats them all at blowing bubbles,

They tell him how the dormouse died,

And all their tiny troubles;

And drag him, if he seems deprest,

To see the baby squirrel's nest.

For hidden treasure he can dig,

Pursue the Indians in the wood,

Feed the prolific guinea-pig

With inappropriate food;

Do all the things that mattered so

In happy days of long ago.

All this he can achieve, and more!

For,‘ neath the magic of his brain,

The young are younger than before,

The old grow young again,

To dream of Beauty and of Truth

For hearts that win eternal youth.

Fat apoplectic men I know,

With well-developed Little Marys,

Look almost human when they show

Their faith in Barrie's fairies;

Their blank lethargic faces lighten

In admiration of his Crichton.

To lovers who, with fingers cold,

Attempt to fan some dying ember,

He brings the happy days of old,

And bids their hearts remember;

Recalling in romantic fashion

The tenderness of earlier passion.

And modern matrons who can find

So little leisure for the Nurs'ry,

Whose interest in babykind

Is eminently curs'ry,

New views on Motherhood acquire

From Alice-sitting-by-the-Fire!

While men of every sort and kind,

At times of sunshine or of trouble,

In Sentimental Tommy find

Their own amazing double;

To each in turn the mem'ry comes

Of some belov'd forgotten Thrums.

To Barrie's literary art

That strong poetic sense is clinging

Which hears, in ev'ry human heart,

A “late lark” faintly singing,

A bird that bears upon its wing

The promise of perpetual Spring.

Materialists may labour much

At problems for the modern stage;

His simpler methods reach and touch

The Young of ev'ry age;

And first and second childhood meet

On common ground at Barrie's feet!