The Fly Away Horse - A Bedtime Poem

I love Eugene Field's poem, The Fly Away Horse.  I read it every night with my little brother for months, but we had stopped reading it for whatever reason the past few years and we randomly flipped to it a few nights ago when we were trying to find a poem to read and it was great to read it together again.  He at first didn't remember that we read it so much but as I started to read, I could see that he was starting to recall the many nights we read the poem.  So here it is, I hope some of you will share it with the little people in your life, I think it puts them in a great place right before bed to fly off into wonderful dreams:

OH, a wonderful horse is the Fly-Away Horse--

Perhaps you have seen him before;

Perhaps, while you slept, his shadow has swept

Through the moonlight that floats on the floor.

For it's only at night, when the stars twinkle bright,

That the Fly-Away Horse, with a neigh

And a pull at his rein and a toss of his mane,

Is up on his heels and away!

The moon in the sky,

As he gallopeth by,

Cries: "Oh! What a marvelous sight!"

And the Stars in dismay

Hide their faces away

In the lap of old Grandmother Night.

 

It is yonder, out yonder, the Fly-Away Horse

Speedeth ever and ever away--

Over meadows and lane, over mountains and plains,

Over streamlets that sing at their play;

And over the sea like a ghost sweepeth he,

While the ships they go sailing below,

And he speedeth so fast that the men on the mast

Adjudge him some portent of woe.

"What ho, there!" they cry,

As he flourishes by

With a whisk of his beautiful tail;

And the fish in the sea

Are as scared as can be,

From the nautilus up to the whale!

 

And the Fly-Away Horse seeks those far-away lands

You little folk dream of at night--

Where candy-trees grow, and honey-brooks flow,

And corn-fields with popcorn are white;

And the beasts in the wood are ever so good

To children who visit them there--

What glory astride of a lion to ride,

Or to wrestle around with a bear!

The monkeys, they say:

"Come on, let us play,"

And they frisk in the coconut-trees:

While the parrots, that cling

To the peanut-vines sing

Or converse with comparative ease!

 

Off! scamper to bed -- you shall ride him to-night!

For, as soon as you've fallen asleep,

With a jubilant neigh he shall bear you away

Over forest and hillside and deep!

But tell us, my dear, all you see and you hear

In those beautiful lands over there,

Where the Fly-Away Horse wings his far-away course

With the wee one consigned to his care.

Then grandma will cry

In amazement: "Oh, my!"

And she'll think it could never be so.

And only we two

Shall know it is true--

You and I, little precious! shall know!