Introduction [to Songs of Innocence]

Piping down the valleys wild
Piping songs of pleasant glee
On a cloud I saw a child
And he laughing said to me:

‘Pipe a song about a Lamb!’
So I piped with merry cheer
‘Piper, pipe that song again.’
So I piped: he wept to hear

‘Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs of happy cheer!’
So I sung the same again
While he wept with joy to hear

P. 2‘Piper, sit thee down and write
In a book, that all may read.’
So he vanished from my sight;
And I plucked a hollow reed

And I made a rural pen
And I stained the water clear
And I wrote my happy songs
Every child may joy to hear