"The Trout" by Amy Lowell

Naughty little speckled trout,

Can’t I coax you to come out?
Is it such great fun to play
In the water every day?
Do you pull the Naiads’ hair
Hiding in the lilies there?
Do you hunt for fishes’ eggs,
Or watch tadpoles grow their legs?
Do the little trouts have school
In some deep sun-glinted pool,
And in recess play at tag
Round that bed of purple flag?
I have tried so hard to catch you,
Hours and hours I’ve sat to watch you;
But you never will come out,
Naughty little speckled trout!

"September, 1918" by Amy Lowell

"Autumn Landscape With Fox," 1918, by Bruno Liljefors

This afternoon was the color of water falling through sunlight;

The trees glittered with the tumbling of leaves;

The sidewalks shone like alleys of dropped maple leaves,

And the houses ran along them laughing out of square, open windows.

Under a tree in the park,

Two little boys, lying flat on their faces,

Were carefully gathering red berries

To put in a pasteboard box.

Some day there will be no war,

Then I shall take out this afternoon

And turn it in my fingers,

And remark the sweet taste of it upon my palate,

And note the crisp variety of its flights of leaves.

Today I can only gather it

And put it into my lunch box,

For I have time for nothing

But the endeavor to balance myself

Upon a broken world.

"September, 1918" by Amy Lowell, from The complete Poetical Works of Amy Lowell. © 1955, Houghton Mifflin Company. © renewed 1983, Houghton Mifflin Company, Brinton P. Roberts, and G. D'Andelot, Esquire.

"The Trout," by Amy Lowell

Naughty little speckled trout,
Can’t I coax you to come out?
Is it such great fun to play
In the water every day?
 
Do you pull the Naiads’ hair
Hiding in the lilies there?
Do you hunt for fishes’ eggs,
Or watch tadpoles grow their legs?
 
Do the little trouts have school
In some deep sun-glinted pool,
And in recess play at tag
Round that bed of purple flag?
 
I have tried so hard to catch you,
Hours and hours I’ve sat to watch you;
But you never will come out,
Naughty little speckled trout!