We built a ship upon the stairs
All made of the back-bedroom chairs,
And filled it full of soft pillows
To go a-sailing on the billows.
We took a saw and several nails,
And water in the nursery pails;
And Tom said, "Let us also take
An apple and a slice of cake;"--
Which was enough for Tom and me
To go a-sailing on, till tea.
We sailed along for days and days,
And had the very best of plays;
But Tom fell out and hurt his knee,
So there was no one left but me.
He obvious had a wonderful childhood and spent much time reflecting back on it. Great work! Marilyn
The love of adventure is a constant in the youth of men- -the fortunate ones, in Stevenson's view- -are those who continue to live life as an adventurer, full of hearty zest and a good mate or two!
Beautifully written poem. It's about never giving up on the life that we dream of. Mr. Stevenson may have felt that all of his friends gave up on their dreams and left him alone, to bear the weight of freedom, but they may not have been dreaming of doing adventurous things for the rest of their life. I know exactly how he feels. We all tend to think that those doing things differently than ourselves are for the worse, but they may think the same of us. The road less travelled may lead to paradise, but the price we pay is loneliness.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
This was a wonderfully written poem. I thought the structure was a quatrain, but the structure is so inconsistant, that it could not be a quatrain. Nevertheless, it is a well written poem with good use of rhyme.