Riley Love-Lyrics | Page 2

of mine.
Though I hear, beneath my study, like a fluttering of wings, The voices of my children, and the mother as she sings,?I feel no twinge of conscience to deny me any theme?When Care has cast her anchor in the harbor of a dream.
In fact, to speak in earnest, I believe it adds a charm?To spice the good a trifle with a little dust of harm--?For I find an extra flavor in Memory's mellow wine?That makes me drink the deeper to that old sweetheart of mine.
[Illustration: (THE VOICES OF MY CHILDREN)]
[Illustration: (THE PINK SUNBONNET)]
A face of lily-beauty, with a form of airy grace,?Floats out of my tobacco as the genii from the vase;?And I thrill beneath the glances of a pair of azure eyes?As glowing as the summer and as tender as the skies.
I can see the pink sunbonnet and the little checkered dress She wore when first I kissed her and she answered the caress With the written declaration that, "as surely as the vine?Grew round the stump," she loved me--that old sweetheart of mine.
[Illustration: (WHEN FIRST I KISSED HER)]
And again I feel the pressure of her slender little hand,?As we used to talk together of the future we had planned--?When I should be a poet, and with nothing else to do?But write the tender verses that she set the music to:
When we should live together in a cozy little cot?Hid in a nest of roses, with a fairy garden-spot,?Where the vines were ever fruited, and the weather ever fine, And the birds were ever singing for that old sweetheart of mine:
[Illustration]
When I should be her lover forever and a day,?And she my faithful sweetheart till the golden hair was gray; And we should be so happy that when either's lips were dumb They would not smile in Heaven till the other's kiss had come.

But, ah! my dream is broken by a step upon the stair,?And the door is softly opened, and--my wife is standing there; Yet with eagerness and rapture all my visions I resign?To greet the living presence of that old sweetheart of mine.
[Illustration: (MY WIFE IS STANDING THERE)]
A' OLD PLAYED-OUT SONG
It's the curiousest thing in creation,?Whenever I hear that old song?"Do They Miss Me at Home," I'm so bothered,?My life seems as short as it's long!--?Fer ev'rything 'pears like adzackly?It 'peared in the years past and gone,--?When I started out sparkin', at twenty,?And had my first neckercher on!
Though I'm wrinkelder, older and grayer?Right now than my parents was then,?You strike up that song "Do They Miss Me,"?And I'm jest a youngster again!--?I'm a-standin' back thare in the furries?A-wishin' fer evening to come,?And a-whisperin' over and over?Them words "Do They Miss Me at Home?"
You see, Marthy Ellen she sung it?The first time I heerd it; and so,?As she was my very first sweetheart,?It reminds me of her, don't you know;--?How her face used to look, in the twilight,?As I tuck her to Spellin'; and she?Kep' a-hummin' that song tel I ast her,?Pine-blank, ef she ever missed me!
I can shet my eyes now, as you sing it,?And hear her low answerin' words;?And then the glad chirp of the crickets,?As clear as the twitter of birds;?And the dust in the road is like velvet,?And the ragweed and fennel and grass?Is as sweet as the scent of the lilies?Of Eden of old, as we pass.
"Do They Miss Me at Home?" Sing it lower--?And softer--and sweet as the breeze?That powdered our path with the snowy?White bloom of the old locus'-trees!?Let the whipperwills he'p you to sing it,?And the echoes 'way over the hill,?Tel the moon boolges out, in a chorus?Of stars, and our voices is still.
[Illustration: (A' OLD PLAYED-OUT SONG)]
But oh! "They's a chord in the music?That's missed when her voice is away!"?Though I listen from midnight tel morning,?And dawn tel the dusk of the day!?And I grope through the dark, lookin' up'ards?And on through the heavenly dome,?With my longin' soul singin' and sobbin'?The words "Do They Miss Me at Home?"
[Illustration: (A' OLD PLAYED-OUT SONG--TAILPIECE)]
[Illustration: (A VERY YOUTHFUL AFFAIR)]
A VERY YOUTHFUL AFFAIR
I'm bin a-visitun 'bout a week?To my little Cousin's at Nameless Creek,?An' I'm got the hives an' a new straw hat,?An' I'm come back home where my beau lives at.
AN OUT-WORN SAPPHO
How tired I am! I sink down all alone?Here by the wayside of the Present. Lo,?Even as a child I hide my face and moan--?A little girl that may no farther go;?The path above me only seems to grow?More rugged, climbing still, and ever briered?With keener thorns of pain than these below;?And O the bleeding feet that falter so
And are so very tired!
Why, I have journeyed from the far-off Lands?Of Babyhood--where baby-lilies blew?Their trumpets in mine ears, and filled my hands?With treasures of perfume and honey-dew,?And where the orchard shadows ever drew?Their cool arms round me when my cheeks