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قراءة كتاب The Barefoot Time
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اللغة: English
الصفحة رقم: 4
class="verse04">In the early morning pale.
’Mid balls and blocks and Noah’s Ark,
Playing on the parlor floor,
Willie, laughing, spins and spins,—
Round it turns, then tumbles o’er.
THE TENEMENT BABIES
Shut off from the world with its light and love,
A joyless prison-house save in name,
With waves of sweltering heat from above,—
From around each corner one meets the same!
Only ill-smelling and fetid air
Is breathed by the babies God leases there!
Not a butterfly blown from the hills of green,
Gives a hint of the wonderful life without;
Not a rainbow of promise is ever seen,—
Nothing but crime and disease about!
No vesper bell calls to praise and prayer,—
Poor little dwarf souls starving there!
Never a carol or note of bird,
As he melts away in the azure blue,
From the tenement house is ever heard;
Nor is felt the wealth of diamond dew,—
Only curses and oaths fill the smoky air,
To poison the babies God leases there!
A FISHING SEER
He sat for hours on the bank that day,
With a serious look—most fishermen’s way,—
Just a waif of a lad with a brimless hat,
And pantaloons even much worse than that.
Dangling legs, without stockings on,
Showed many a mark of brier and thorn,
But indifferent he to trifles like these,
As he sat and fished in the teasing breeze.
I paused as I passed on my way to town,
And set for a moment my burden down:
“Aren’t you discouraged,” I said with zest,
“Fishing so long here without success?”
“Oh, no! such fishing just pleases me,”
The lad said slowly, “for don’t you see,
We can’t all catch—and I for one,
In just a-trying get lots of fun!”
I picked up my burden and walked away,
Wise with the lesson I’d learned that day,
And silently blessed my new-found seer,—
This ragged, fishing philosopher!
JUST A-WISHING
The boy who’s always wishing,—
Why, we pass him on the street,
We see him in the office,
On the gridiron we meet;
It may be in the morning,
It’s just the same at night,
He’s wishing things would change a bit;
They’re not exactly right.
He wishes he were smart like Tom,
But then, Tom has a “snap”,—
To him things are so easy;
He doesn’t care a “rap”
How long and hard the lesson.
But isn’t this the way:
While Tom is hard a-grinding,
He is wasting time in play?
He wishes he had money,
Just enough to treat a friend;
He cannot see how Henry
Has all he wants to spend.
But while he’s idly wishing
He were rich like Carl or Bob,
Henry has his coat off working,—
He has found an honest job.
He wishes he could bat the ball,
Or kick a goal like Dick,
But when it’s time for practice,
He feels a trifle sick.
And thus he keeps a-wishing,
Never thinks “I can”, and “will”;
So where’er you chance to meet him,
You will find him wishing still.
A PRISON HOUSE
High are its walls so you can’t see o’er,
And so narrow are they that one can’t get in;
Nor outward swings its close-barred door
Of Love, to welcome one’s kith and kin.
The shutter of Sympathy’s never drawn
To send forth a message of hope and cheer;
The flag on the tower, from eve till dawn,
Reads, “I live alone; please don’t come near.”
“And who is the inmate,—some witch or elf?
And the name of the house? I cannot guess!”
The inmate’s a shriveled-up dwarf called Self,
And the narrow house is Selfishness!
THE LITTLE HAIR TRUNK
There’s a little hair trunk in the attic stored,
Under the rafters packed away;
With a heart nigh broken, a mother’s hands
Tenderly carried it there one day.
The tears fell fast as she closed the lid
On the homely trinkets—you’ll call them so,—
That her baby loved, then with one more kiss
On the little hair trunk, she turned to go.
Now on the lid is the dust of years,—
I wonder what think all the toys within!
Do they wish for the baby voice, still so