Versedays: A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky by Lewis Carroll

Not very sunny, but a boat under the sky nevertheless!

Image Credit: Birdy

I have only seen cartoons of Alice in Wonderland when I was a child, I haven’t read the book. But now after reading Lewis Carroll’s poem “A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky” I think I would love to read it. In fact, the poem appears at the conclusion of the book, I am told, and in it Carroll applies a charming acrostic. Notice that the first letters of each line spell out “Alice Pleasance Liddell.” So here it is, Versedays choice for this week!

A Boat beneath a Sunny Sky

by

Lewis Carroll


A BOAT beneath a sunny sky,
Lingering onward dreamily
In an evening of July —

Children three that nestle near,
Eager eye and willing ear,
Pleased a simple tale to hear —

Long has paled that sunny sky:
Echoes fade and memories die:
Autumn frosts have slain July.

Still she haunts me, phantomwise,
Alice moving under skies
Never seen by waking eyes.

Children yet, the tale to hear,
Eager eye and willing ear,
Lovingly shall nestle near.

In a Wonderland they lie,
Dreaming as the days go by,
Dreaming as the summers die:

Ever drifting down the stream —
Lingering in the golden gleam —
Life, what is it but a dream?