Under the bushes by the gate
Is where I live in royal state,
And lovelier my palace stands
Than any palace made with hands;
For houses made with hands, you see,
Must be what hands can make them be,
But those you build inside your head
Can be just what you like instead.
And so, because to be a king
Is such a very pleasant thing,
Beneath the biggest bush I sit
And rear a palace out of it.
The walls with arras-cloth are hung
And all the woven scenes among
Are magic trees that wave about,
And magic birds hop in and out.
And though the ceiling’s chiefly green,
Magic the spaces in between,
Which, as you watch, all through the day
Are changing—white and blue and grey—
Whilst on the floor are neatly laid
Carpets of brown and gold brocade;
And golden velvet cloths are strewn
To keep quite clean my ivory throne.
[Illustration: _King of the castle._]
And, oh, no king has anywhere
More courtiers than I have there;
Indeed, so many at my call
There are I cannot count them all.
In hose and doublet, silk and lace,
Grandly they move about the place,
Till lawns and paths are gayer far
Than all the gardener’s flower-beds are.
And yet (it’s very strange but true!)
The gardener and the postman too
And milk-boys clattering to and fro
Across my courtyard never know
What splendid folk they walk among,
But pass them as they go along,
For all the world as though there were
Just no one walking, talking there.
Nor do they know—’tis plain to see—
That this small boy who looks like me
Is really King of all the land
And could, did he but lift a hand,
Cast them in deepest dungeons or
Hang, draw and quarter them in four.
Or they’d not dare to shout “Good-day!”
In such a very casual way.