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Lyric Poem · Sad

The Little Boy Found

by William Blake

1The little boy lost in the lonely fen,

2 Led by the wandering light,

3Began to cry, but God, ever nigh,

4 Appeared like his father, in white.

5He kissed the child, and by the hand led,

6 And to his mother brought,

7Who in sorrow pale, through the lonely dale,

8 The little boy weeping sought.

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Quick facts

Poem
The Little Boy Found
Poet
William Blake
Length
8 lines
Form
Lyric Poem, Short Poems
Themes
Sad, Love, Childhood, Short

Craft notes

How this poem works

Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.

Shape
8 lines · 2 quatrains
The poem’s silhouette — approximate syllables per line, measured from the text above. Even bars mean a measured line; ragged bars mean the poem sets its own widths.

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Text, source & rights

A traceable edition

Full-text display is based on the committed source record and a United States term-expiry review.

Author record
William Blake1757–1827
Source record
PoetryDBThe Little Boy Found by william-blake, PoetryDB transcription
Display decision
Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
Publication record
Not recorded in the imported source
Text fingerprint
SHA-256 064ead457a72ee72
Editorial handling
Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
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