I. There'S A Story No One Knows, But Myself, About A Rose And A Fairy And A Star Where The Toyland People Are. Once When I Had Gone To Bed, Mother Said It Was A Dream, From A Rose Above My Head, Growing By The Window-Beam, Out There Popped A Fairy'S Head. Ii. And He Nodded At Me: Smiled: Said, "You're Fond Of Stories, Eh? Well, I Know A Star Each Child Ought To Know. It's Far Away Foryour Kind, But Not For Me. I Will Take You To That Star, Where You'll Hear New Stories; See? Close Your Eyes. It Is N'T Far That Is, 'T Is N'T Far For Me." Iii. And he'd Hardly Spoken When From The Rose There Came A Moth; And Before You'd Counted Ten We Were On It, And Were Both Flying To That Star That Made Silver Sparkles In The Air. And, Though I Was Not Afraid, I Was Glad When We Were There, And The Moth Was Stabled White In A Lily-Bud, And We Went To Find The Fay Or Sprite Who, He Said, Would Welcome Me. Iv. And We Found Her.'T Was N'T Long Till We Heard A Twittering Song, And A Toy-Bird With White Eyes Flew Before Us From The Skies, Like Those In My Noah'S Ark, And We Followed It; And Came To The Strangest Land: Our Park Is Just Like It, Just The Same. Toy-Trees, Squirrels, Birds And Brooks, And A Castle On The Hill, Just Like Those In Story-Books; And Upon Its Windowsill Leaned A Lovely Princess. She Smiled At Me, And That Was All, As A Doll Smiles; And To Me She Was Like A Great Big Doll. V. Then, Before I Knew It, I Was Inside Her Palace, There In The Room; And Everywhere Dolls And Story-Books And, My! All The Dolls Began To Sing Rhymes, Or Read; And Others Told Stories Just Like Everything: Better Stories Than The Old Ones My Father Reads Me In Mother Goose And Books Like Grimm, That He Hates So To Begin: Tales For Which I Bother Him, Since, He Says, Both Tales And Rhymes He Has Read A Thousand Times. Vi. Blue Beard And The Yellow Dwarf, And The Lovely Rapunzel, She Whose Hair Was Once A Scarf For A Prince To Climb By; Nell, Little Nell, Or Else Her Twin, Who, Somehow, Had Happened In, And The Sleeping Beauty, Who Seemed Asleep And Sat There Dumb; Hansel And Sweet Grethel Too, Snow-Drop And Hop-O'-My-Thumb; Rumpelstiltzkin, Riding Hood, And The Babes-Lost-In-The-Wood, Met Around A Little Table, Where I Sat Beside A Queen, Queen Of Hearts, And, Dressed In Green, Robin Hood, A-Eating Tarts, While Old ?Sop Told A Fable, Sitting By The King Of Hearts. Vii. And The Waiters Were Bo Peep, Knave Of Hearts And Marjory Daw; Boy Blue, Slow As If Asleep, And The Woman Who Slept On Straw. And The Little Dishes All, Though They Seemed So, Were Not Small; Painted Blue And Green And Gold With The Stories I'd Heard Told, Pictures Forming Of Themselves, Of The Elf Queen And The Elves. Never, Never Have I Seen Service Like It. Then The Talk! All About The Fairy Queen And The Land Of Tarts And Pies, Where Those Three Fat Brothers Go, Greedygut, With Tiny Eyes Like A Pig'S; And Sleepyhead, With His Candle, Going To Bed; And Old Creepy-Footed Slow. Of These Three They Made Great Talk, And That Land Where Scarecrows Stalk, And The Jack-O'-Lanterns Grow, Row On Glaring Goblin Row. Viii. Suddenly, Among Them There, At My Back, Above My Chair, Cried A Cuckoo Clock, And Why! There I Was Back Home; And I Was N'T Nowhere But In Bed And My Mother Standing By Smiling At Me. I Could Cry When I Think The Things They Said That I Can'tremember Now Though I Try And Try And Try. But I Knowthis Anyhow: I Was In That Star, I Know, And In Toyland. Does N'T Seem Anything But True, Although Mother Says It Was A Dream.