Works

GIVE us your hand, Mr. Lawyer: how do you do to-day?

"GIVE US YOUR HAND, MR. LAWYER: HOW DO YOU DO TO-DAY?"

You drew up that paper--I s'pose you want your pay....

("Comme le matin rit sur les roses.")

[Bk. I. xii.]


The dawn is smiling on the dew that covers
The tearful roses - lo, the little lovers -
That kiss the buds and all the flutterings...

Tune - "The bonnie lad that's far awa."


I.

O how can I be blythe and glad,
Or how can I gang brisk and braw,
When the bonnie lad that I lo'e best
Is o'er the hills and far awa?...

Written when the clock was set ahead one hour on April 1, 1918.


Our Rooster wakes at half-past five
And crows with all his might,
He tries to wake the people up
Before the day is light....

How can you bear to look at the Neva?
How can you bear to cross the bridges?.
Not in vain am I known as the grieving one
Since the time you appeared to me.
The black angels' wings are sharp,...

How clear she shines! How quietly
I lie beneath her guardian light;
While heaven and earth are whispering me,
"To morrow, wake, but dream to-night."
Yes, Fancy, come, my Fairy love!...

Tune - "John Anderson, my jo."


I.

How cruel are the parents
Who riches only prize,
And, to the wealthy booby,
Poor woman sacrifice!
Meanwhile the hapless daughter...

How dare the robins sing,
When men and women hear
Who since they went to their account
Have settled with the year! --
Paid all that life had earned
In one consummate bill,...

How dear to me the hour when daylight dies,
And sunbeams melt along the silent sea,
For then sweet dreams of other days arise,
And memory breathes her vesper sigh to thee.
...

"How did you rest, last night?" -
I've heard my gran'pap say
Them words a thousand times - that's right -
Jes them words thataway!
As punctchul-like as morning dast
To ever heave in sight...

How does Love speak?
In the faint flush upon the tell-tale cheek,
And in the pallor that succeeds it; by
The quivering lid of an averted eye -
The smile that proves the parent of a sigh:...

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace....

How doth the little crocodile
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the waters of the Nile
On every golden scale!

How cheerfully he seems to grin
How neatly spreads his claws,...

Do' a-stan'in' on a jar, fiah a-shinin' thoo,
Ol' folks drowsin' 'roun' de place, wide awake is Lou,
W'en I tap, she answeh, an' I see huh 'mence to grin,
"Howdy, honey, howdy, won't you step right in?"
...

Well, then! How'd you like to bear the name of Butler
As an honor badge eight centuries at least,
And then have the Prohibitionists inform you
That a butler is a sort of outlawed beast?

The vainest girls in forty states
Were Gwendolyn and Gladys Gates;
They warbled, slightly off the air,
Romantic German songs,
And each of them upon her hair
Employed the curling tongs,...

Somewhere, sometime, long, long ago, I read a poem. It was soon forgotten ... but the first line has stuck in my memory -

'How fair, how fresh were the roses ...'
...

How fast the year is going by!
Love, it will be September soon;
O let us make the best of June.
Already, love, it is July;
The rose and honeysuckle go,
And all too soon will come the snow.
...

The stream is shrunk, the pool is dry,
And we be comrades, thou and I;
With fevered jowl and dusty flank
Each jostling each along the bank;
And, by one drouthy fear made still,...

From the play "Mother Courage"

You saw sagacious Solomon
You know what came of him,
To him complexities seemed plain.
He cursed the hour that gave birth to him
And saw that everything was vain....