WHO LIGHTS THE FIRE?

Who lights the fire — that forth so gracefully

And freely frolicketh the fairy smoke?

Some pretty one who never felt the yoke —

Glad girl, or maiden more sedate than she.

Pedant it cannot, villain cannot be!

Some genius, may-be, his own symbol woke;

But puritan, nor rogue in virtue's cloke,

Nor kitchen-maid has done it certainly!

Ha, ha! you cannot find the lighter out

For all the blue smoke's pantomimic gesture —

His name or nature, sex or age or vesture!

The fire was lit by human care, no doubt —

But now the smoke is Nature's tributary,

Dancing‘ twixt man and nothing like a fairy.