Page 28 - Poetry-Whimsy

Beside a pail
With marks unknown to me! Though here I’ve got
Two pitchers gray This mixed up lot,
Where Bacchus gay To show my taste
And satyrs queer, And money’s waste,
Do reel and leer, I honestly declare,
Half dressed, as bold as brass, That still by far,
And Solon vase The ginger jar
Attract the gaze, On lowest shelf,
In spite of hints Decked by myself,
Of rainbow tints I think the finest there!
In iridescent glass!
And flagon bright So come and see
Lined through with white, My pottery,
Whose royal show And hear me quote
Of crimson glow By book and rote,
Is like a robe of state The lore too grave for rhyme;
In Venice worn, And when to all
Where it was born, Both great and small,
By Doge old, You’ve made your bow,
Ere Yankee gold I’ll tell you how
Passed Salviati’s gate! I caught the craze from Prime!

— Mrs. Sarah Bridges Stebbins (Demorest, 1880)

Looking Behind

Come read of old Sturgis, a person inclined
To practice the habit of looking behind.
Wherever he journeyed he always was found
On street or on square with his head twisted round.
It seemed as if Nature had erred in her plan
Of placing both eyes in the face of this man.
If one from the back of his head had looked out
He then had been spared so much turning about;
And thus he continued the best of his days,
Unmindful of censure, unchanged in his ways.

~ 26 ~