The Water Nymphs in  General   

They hide in the brook when I seek to draw nearer,
Laughing amain when I feign to depart;
Often I hear them, now faint and now clearer—
Innocent bold or so sweetly discreet.
Are they Nymphs of the Stream at their playing
Or but the brook I mistook for a voice?
Little care I; for, despite harsh Time’s flaying,
Brook voice or Nymph voice still makes me rejoice.

By Ellis Parker Butler

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Other poems by Ellis Parker Butler:

• A Culinary Puzzle
• A Lost Angel
• A Minute
• A Pastoral
• A Question
• A Satisfactory Reform
• A Scotchman Whose Name Was Isbister
• A St. Valentine’s Day Tragedy
• An Old-Fashioned Garden
• Anticipation
• At Variance
• Bird Nesting
• Circumstantial Evidence
• Cupid Caught Napping
• Djolan
• Golden Silence
• Good - Better - Best
• How’d You Like It?
• Immortality
• Judgment Day
• Little Ballads Of Timely Warning; II: On Malicious
• Little Ballads Of Timely Warning; III: On Laziness
• Mary Had A Little Frog
• Merry Christmas And Happy New Year!
• Millennium
• Mouths Of Hippopotami And Some Recent Novels
• Night In The City
• No Beer, No Work
• October
• Outbid
• Partners
• Reasonable Interest
• Ridden Down
• Says Mister Doojabs
• Song For Heroes
• Speaking Of Operations
• The Ballad Of A Bachelor
• The Ballade Of The Automobile
• The Charge of the Second Iowa Cavalry
• The Daughter Of The Year
• The Final Tax
• The Golf Walk
• The Hunter
• The Poor Boy’s Christmas
• The Rich Boy’s Christmas
• The Romance Of Patrolman Casey
• The Sheep
• The Tearful Tale Of Captain Dan
• The Twenty Hoss-Power Shay
• The Water Nymphs
• The Whale
• The Wood Nymph
• To Jessica, Gone Back To The City
• To Kate. (In Lieu Of A Valentine)
• To Marguerite
• To May
• To Phyllis And May
• Valentine To The Girl In Black
• Western
• When Ida Puts Her Armor On
• Why I Went To The Foot
• Why Washington Retreated
• Womanly Qualms
• Would You Believe It?