I love the little things of grace
That beautify my native place;
The blithe song birds, the sweet wild-flowers,
The spells of sunshine and the showers.

The sun-reflecting cottage panes;
Carts rattling over roads and lanes;
The snowdrops in the storms a-bloom
That gladden us ‘mid winter gloom.

I love the robin as it grieves
O’er faded joys ‘mong faded leaves;
I like the way it tilts its head
To cheek me for a crumb of bread.

I love the artless loveliness
Of country girls in rustic dress;
School-children dallying awhile
O’er a bird’s nest or a flower’s smile.

An old man by his cottage door
Culling dream-shells on childhood’s shore;
Or in the scrap-book of the past
Reviewing scenes that fled too fast.

A jocund thrush, a joyful lark,
A corncrake shouting in the dark;
Dearer to me these little things
Than worldly wealth or pomp of kings.

Michael Mullin, ‘The Bard of Foremass’
Foremass Lower, Sixmilecross, Co. Tyrone.

Newspaper cutting – won a prize of
Half a guinea in The Sunday Independent