Riley Child-Rhymes | Page 9

James Whitcomb Riley
thing!?And I'd limped out t'other day?With my old cheer this-a-way,?Swingin' her and rockin' too,?Thinkin' how _I_ ust to do?At her age, when suddently,?"Hey, Gran'pap!" she says to me,?"Why you rock so slow?" ... Says I,?"Waitin' fer the cat to die!"
[Illustration: Why you rock so slow?]
NAUGHTY CLAUDE
[Illustration: Naughty Claude]
When Little Claude was naughty wunst?At dinner-time, an' said?He won't say "Thank you" to his Ma,?She maked him go to bed?An' stay two hours an' not git up,--?So when the clock struck Two,?Nen Claude says,--"Thank you, Mr. Clock,?I'm much obleeged to you!"
THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN
[Illustration: The South Wind and The Sun--Title]
O the South Wind and the Sun?How each loved the other one--?Full of fancy--full of folly--
Full of jollity and fun!?How they romped and ran about,?Like two boys when school is out,?With glowing face, and lisping lip,
Low laugh, and lifted shout!
And the South Wind--he was dressed?With a ribbon round his breast?That floated, flapped and fluttered
In a riotous unrest;?And a drapery of mist,?From the shoulder and the wrist?Flowing backward with the motion
Of the waving hand he kissed.
And the Sun had on a crown?Wrought of gilded thistledown,?And a scarf of velvet vapor,
And a raveled-rainbow gown;?And his tinsel-tangled hair,?Tossed and lost upon the air,?With glossier and flossier
Than any anywhere.
And the South Wind's eyes were two?Little dancing drops of dew,?As he puffed his cheeks, and pursed his lips,
And blew and blew and blew!?And the Sun's--like diamond-stone,?Brighter yet than ever known,?As he knit his brows and held his breath,
And shone and shone and shone!
And this pair of merry fays?Wandered through the summer days;?Arm-in-arm they went together
Over heights of morning haze--?Over slanting slopes of lawn?They went on and on and on,?Where the daisies looked like star-tracks
Trailing up and down the dawn.
And where'er they found the top?Of a wheat-stalk droop and lop,?They chucked it underneath the chin
And praised the lavish crop,?Till it lifted with the pride?Of the heads it grew beside,?And then the South Wind and the Sun
Went onward satisfied.
Over meadow-lands they tripped,?Where the dandelions dipped?In crimson foam of clover bloom
And dripped and dripped and dripped!?And they clinched the bumble-stings,?Gauming honey on their wings,?And bundling them in lily-bells,
With maudlin murmurings.
And the humming-bird, that hung?Like a jewel up among?The tilted honeysuckle horns,
They mesmerized and swung?In the palpitating air,?Drowsed with odors strange and rare,?And, with whispered laughter, slipped away,
And left him hanging there.
And they braided blades of grass?Where the truant had to pass;?And they wriggled through the rushes
And the reeds of the morass,?Where they danced, in rapture sweet,?O'er the leaves that laid a street?Of undulant mosaic for
The touches of their feet.
By the brook with mossy brink,?Where the cattle came to drink,?They trilled and piped and whistled
With the thrush and bobolink,?Till the kine, in listless pause,?Switched their tails in mute applause,?With lifted heads, and dreamy eyes,
And bubble-dripping jaws.
And where the melons grew,?Streaked with yellow, green and blue,?These jolly sprites went wandering
Through spangled paths of dew;?And the melons, here and there,?They made love to, everywhere,?Turning their pink souls to crimson
With caresses fond and fair.
[Illustration: This pair of merry fays]
Over orchard walls they went,?Where the fruited boughs were bent?Till they brushed the sward beneath them
Where the shine and shadow blent;?And the great green pear they shook?Till the sallow hue forsook?Its features, and the gleam of gold
Laughed out in every look.
And they stroked the downy cheek?Of the peach, and smoothed it sleek,?And flushed it into splendor;
And, with many an elfish freak,?Gave the russet's rust a wipe--?Prankt the rambo with a stripe,?And the winesap blushed its reddest
As they spanked the pippins ripe.
Through the woven ambuscade?That the twining vines had made,?They found the grapes, in clusters,
Drinking up the shine and shade--?Plumpt, like tiny skins of wine,?With a vintage so divine?That the tongue of Fancy tingled
With the tang of muscadine.
And the golden-banded bees,?Droning o'er the flowery leas,?They bridled, reined, and rode away
Across the fragrant breeze,?Till in hollow oak and elm?They had groomed and stabled them?In waxen stalls that oozed with dews
Of rose and lily-stem.
Where the dusty highway leads,?High above the wayside weeds,?They sowed the air with butterflies
Like blooming flower-seeds,?Till the dull grasshopper sprung?Half a man's-height up, and hung?Tranced in the heat, with whirring wings,
And sung and sung and sung!
And they loitered, hand in hand,?Where the snipe along the sand?Of the river ran to meet them
As the ripple meets the land,?Till the dragonfly, in light?Gauzy armor, burnished bright,?Came tilting down the waters
In a wild, bewildered flight.
And they heard the kildee's call,?And afar, the waterfall,?But the rustle of a falling leaf
They heard above it all;?And the trailing willow crept?Deeper in the tide that swept?The leafy shallop to the shore,
And wept and wept and wept!
And the fairy vessel veered?From its moorings--tacked and steered?For the center of the current--
Sailed away and disappeared:?And the burthen that it bore?From the long-enchanted shore--?"Alas! the South Wind and the Sun!"
I murmur evermore.
For the South Wind and the Sun,?Each so loves the other one,?For all his jolly
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