the secret

I get in trouble for assuming other people are like me: terrible with secrets. As I explained to my dear sister-in-love, "It's not that I think YOU run your mouth off. It's that I KNOW I do, and I just paint everyone else with the same brush." It doesn't help that I get things like this from friends (I'm looking at you, Kellie) immediately after swearing THEM to secrecy:

We have a secret, just we three,

The robin, and I, and the sweet cherry-tree;

The bird told the tree, and the tree told me,

And nobody knows it but just us three.

But of course the robin knows it best,

Because she built the--I shan't tell the rest;

And laid the four little--something in it--

I'm afraid I shall tell it every minute.

But if the tree and the robin don't peep,

I'll try my best the secret to keep;

Though I know when the little birds fly about

Then the whole secret will be out.