The Spanish Needle

Lovely dainty Spanish needle

 With your yellow flower and white,

Dew bedecked and softly sleeping,

 Do you think of me to-night?

Shadowed by the spreading mango,

 Nodding o'er the rippling stream,

Tell me, dear plant of my childhood,

 Do you of the exile dream?

Do you see me by the brook's side

 Catching crayfish 'neath the stone,

As you did the day you whispered:

 Leave the harmless dears alone?

Do you see me in the meadow

 Coming from the woodland spring

With a bamboo on my shoulder

 And a pail slung from a string?

Do you see me all expectant

 Lying in an orange grove,

While the swee-swees sing above me,

 Waiting for my elf-eyed love?

Lovely dainty Spanish needle,

 Source to me of sweet delight,

In your far-off sunny southland

 Do you dream of me to-night?