Impertinent Poems Part 9

Plumed and petted, Galled and fretted!

Why do you eye him askance With a quiver of hate in your glance?

Why not conceive him as human, Nursed at the breast of a woman, Growing, mayhap, as he could, Not as he would?

How are you sure you would be Better and wiser than he?

Look at the woman whose eye Follows you by.

Silked and satined, Scented, fattened!

Why does the half smile slip Into a sneer on your lip?

You pity her? Ah, but the fashion Of your complacent compa.s.sion.

Pity her! yet you have said, "Better the creature were dead.

What is there left here for her But to err?"

Thus would you make the world right, Hiding its ills from your sight.

Look at the man with the pack Breaking his back.

Ragged, squalid, Wretched, stolid.

And you are sorry, you say, (Much as you are at a play.) But do you say to him, "Brother, Twin-born son of our mother What were the word, or the deed Fitting your need?"

Or, as he slouches by, Do you breathe "G.o.d be praised, I am I?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "G.o.d be praised, I am I!"

_Page 74._]

THE SQUEALER.

Of course some people are born so bright That no matter what one may say, or write, The theme is old and the lesson is trite, Which is what you may say, as these lines unreel And I mildly suggest it is better to feel Than to squeal.

Everybody knows that? Yes, it's certain they do, Everybody, that is, with exception of two, Of whom I am one and the other is you.

But for us the lesson is still remote, Although we commit it and cite it and quote It by rote.

But still when you thrill with the thudding thump From the fist of the fellow you tried to b.u.mp And the world looks hard at the swelling lump, There's a strong temptation to open your door And invite the public to hear you roar That you're sore.

And again, tho' 'tis plain as the printed page:-- "Keep your hand on the lever and watch the gauge When the fire-pot's full and the boilers rage,"

How often the steam-pressure grows and grows And before the engineer cares or knows, Up she goes.

So why should you fret if I send you to school Again to consider the sapient rule That Wisdom is Silence and Speech is a Fool.

Close up! and a year from to-day you will kneel And thank the good Lord that you knew how to feel And not squeal.

DISTANCE AND DISENCHANTMENT.

He was playing New York, and on Broadway at that; I was playing in stock, in Chicago.

I heard that his Hamlet fell fearfully flat; He heard I was fierce, as Iago.

Each looked to the other exceedingly small; We were too far apart, that is all.

You, too, if your vision is ever reflective, Have noticed your rival is small in perspective.

I heard him in Memphis (a chance matinee); He heard me (one Sunday) in Dallas.

His critics, I swore, never witnessed the play; He vowed mine were prompted by malice.

A pleasanter fellow I cannot recall.

We were closer together; that's all.

And your rival, too, if you once see him clearly, Is clever, or how could he rival you, nearly?

In Seattle they said he was greater than Booth, (Or in Portland, perhaps; I've forgotten); I said 'twas ungracious to speak the plain truth, But his work in the first act was rotten.

I had only intended to speak of the thrall Of his wonderful fifth act; that's all.

But when a man's praised far ahead of his talents, I guess you say something to even the balance.

In Atlanta I heard a remark that he made And again in Mobile, Alabama;-- That he hardly thought Shakespeare was meant to be played Like a ten-twenty-thirt' melodrama.

Oh, well, there was one honey-drop in the gall; The fellow was jealous; that's all.

And you, too, have found, when a friendship is broken, That his words are worse than the ones you have spoken.

[Ill.u.s.tration: To even the balance

_Page 77._]

FAMILY RESEMBLANCE.

I used to boost the P. and P., Designed to run from sea to sea, From Portland, Ore., to Portland, Me., But which, as all the maps agree, Begins somewhere in Minnesota And peters out in North Dakota.

You gibed because I used to mock Its streaks of rust and rolling-stock, Its schedule and its G. P. A.

(Who took your Annual away,) But lately you seem much inclined To own a sudden change of mind.

Ah, me, You're much like other folks, I see.

I much admired the book reviews Of Quillip of the Daily News.

I laughed to see him put the screws On some sprig of the late Who's-Whos, Tear off his verbiage and skin him To show the little there was in him.

You said the book he wrote himself Lay stranded on the dealer's shelf And wasn't worthy a critique; (Just what he said of mine last week).

Perhaps your reasoning was strong And you were right and I was wrong.

Heigho!

I'm very much like you, I know.

O'Brien's zeal ran almost daft In its antipathy to graft.

He raked the practice fore and aft; Lord! how his sulphurous breath would waft "Eternal and infernal tarmint To ivery grasping, grafting, varmint."

The worst of these upon the planet, He said, were those who wanted granite In public buildings,--"yis, begorry!"

(O'Brien owns a sandstone quarry.) Of course I'd hate to see it tested, But would he be less interested In civic virtue--uninvested?

Oh, dear!

O'Brien's much like us, I fear.

NEED.