Riley Love-Lyrics | Page 8

I am, and here you air; and yer
mother--where is she?
You look lots like yer mother: Purty much same in size; And about the
same complected; and favor about the eyes: Like her, too, about
_livin'_ here,--because _she_ couldn't stay: It'll 'most seem like you was
dead--like her!--But I hain't got
nothin' to say!
She left you her little Bible--writ yer name acrost the page-- And left
her ear bobs fer you, ef ever you come of age. I've allus kep'em and
gyuarded 'em, but ef yer goin' away-- Nothin' to say, my daughter!
Nothin' at all to say!

You don't rikollect her, I reckon? No; you wasn't a year old then! And
now yer--how old _air_ you? W'y, child, not _"twenty!"_ When? And
yer nex' birthday's in Aprile? and you want to git married that
day? I wisht yer mother was livin'!--But--I hain't got nothin' to say!
Twenty year! and as good a gyrl as parent ever found!
There's a straw
ketched onto yer dress there--I'll bresh it
off--turn around. (Her mother was jes' twenty when us two run away!)

Nothin' to say, my daughter! Nothin' at all to say!
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
IKE WALTON'S PRAYER
I crave, dear Lord,
No boundless hoard
Of gold and gear,
Nor
jewels fine,
Nor lands, nor kine,
Nor treasure-heaps of anything.--

Let but a little hut be mine
Where at the hearthstone I may hear
The cricket sing,
And have the shine
Of one glad woman's eyes to
make,
For my poor sake,
Our simple home a place divine;--
Just
the wee cot--the cricket's chirr--
Love, and the smiling face of her.
I pray not for
Great riches, nor
For vast estates, and castle-halls,--

Give me to hear the bare footfalls
Of children o'er
An oaken floor,

New-rinsed with sunshine, or bespread
With but the tiny coverlet

And pillow for the baby's head;
And pray Thou, may
The door
stand open and the day
Send ever in a gentle breeze,
With fragrance
from the locust-trees,
And drowsy moan of doves, and blur
Of
robin-chirps, and drone of bees,
[Illustration]
With afterhushes of the stir
Of intermingling sounds, and then
The

good-wife and the smile of her
Filling the silences again--
The cricket's call,
And the wee cot,
Dear Lord of all,
Deny me
not!
I pray not that
Men tremble at
My power of place
And lordly
sway,--
I only pray for simple grace
To look my neighbor in the
face
Full honestly from day to day--
Yield me his horny palm to
hold,
And I'll not pray
For gold;--
The tanned face, garlanded with mirth,

It hath the kingliest smile on earth--
The swart brow, diamonded
with sweat,
Hath never need of coronet.
And so I reach,
Dear Lord, to Thee,
And do beseech
Thou givest
me
The wee cot, and the cricket's chirr,
Love, and the glad sweet
face of her.
[Illustration]
ILLILEO
Illileo, the moonlight seemed lost across the vales--
The stars but
strewed the azure as an armor's scattered scales; The airs of night were
quiet as the breath of silken sails; And all your words were sweeter than
the notes of nightingales.
Illileo Legardi, in the garden there alone,
With your figure carved of
fervor, as the Psyche carved of stone, There came to me no murmur of
the fountain's undertone
So mystically, musically mellow as your
own.
You whispered low, Illileo--so low the leaves were mute, And the
echoes faltered breathless in your voice's vain pursuit; And there died
the distant dalliance of the serenader's lute: And I held you in my
bosom as the husk may hold the fruit. Illileo, I listened. I believed you.

In my bliss,
What were all the worlds above me since I found you
thus in this?-- Let them reeling reach to win me--- even Heaven I would
miss, Grasping earthward!--I would cling here, though I clung by just a
kiss!
And blossoms should grow odorless--and lilies all aghast-- And I said
the stars should slacken in their paces through the vast, Ere yet my
loyalty should fail enduring to the last.--
So vowed I. It is written. It
is changeless as the past.
Illileo Legardi, in the shade your palace throws
Like a cowl about the
singer at your gilded porticos,
A moan goes with the music that may
vex the high repose Of a heart that fades and crumbles as the crimson
of a rose.
[Illustration]
THE WIFE-BLESSÉD
In youth he wrought, with eyes ablur
Lorn-faced and long of hair--

In youth--in youth he painted her
A sister of the air--
Could clasp
her not, but felt the stir
Of pinions everywhere.
II
She lured his gaze, in braver days,
And tranced him sirenwise;
And
he did paint her, through a haze
Of sullen paradise,
With scars of
kisses on her face
And embers in her eyes.
III
And now--nor dream nor wild conceit--
Though faltering, as before--

Through tears he paints her, as is meet,
Tracing the dear face o'er

With lilied patience meek and sweet
As Mother Mary wore.
[Illustration]

[Illustration]
MY MARY
My Mary, O my Mary!
The simmer-skies are blue;
The dawnin'
brings the dazzle,
An' the gloamin' brings the dew?--
The mirk o'
nicht the glory
O' the moon, an' kindles, too,
The stars that shift
aboon