During April, National Poetry Month, we are posting a poem a day. If you would like to suggest one, please email it in. Today’s poem is by Eugene Field who was born in Missouri but raised in Massachusetts. He wrote verse in 1880’s and is perhaps best known for best known for Wynken Blynken and Nod. Though light and written for children his poems have a unique wistfulness as the one below demonstrates.

Little Boy Blue by Eugene Field

THE little toy dog is covered with dust,
But sturdy and stanch he stands;
The little toy sholder is covered with rust,
And his musket molds in the hands.
Time was when the little toy dog was new,
And the soldier was passing fair;
And that was the time when our Little Boy Blue
Kissed them and put them there.

“Now, don’t you go till I come,” he said,
“And don’t you make any noise!”
So, toddling off to his trundle-bed,
He dremt of the pretty toys;
And, as he was dreaming, an angel song
Awakened our Little Boy Blue–
Oh! the years are many, the years are long,
But the little toy friends are true!

Aye, faithful to Little Boy Blue they stand,
Each in the same old place–
Awaiting the touch of a little hand,
The smile of a little face;
And they wonder, as waiting the long years through
In the dust of that little chair,
What has become of our Little Boy Blue,
Since he kissed them and put them there.