A little cloud stood lonely
Amid the evening sky;
Doubting and fearful waiting there,—
No other cloudlet nigh.

Poor faint and weakling timid lamb
Far wandered from the fold,
The shepherd never missed at all,—
Forgotten in the cold.

My cloudlet wavered on the blue,
The heaven-meadow scanned
For hope of any cloudy friend
With misty, beckoning hand;

A moment longer waited,
Abandoned by the day;
Then, like a little spirit cloud,
He faded quite away.