Eve

He was a god to her
Powerful and kindly
She would have died for him
Gladly and blindly.

Imagine the shock when she
Found he was human
And heard him, quite man-like,
Blaming a woman!

Spanking

I spanked a little boy last night
I tho't I was doing right,
I tho't that I was punishing
A little boy for some wrong thing.

Today I bought a ball and kite
For that same boy I spanked last night
Bought marbles, tops, and every thing
To counteract the punishing

You see, through tears, this little lad
Tried hard to smile, and then said "Dad",
"Will spanking make me good, like you"
I think you would have bought things, too.

Follies

I could not ask a better world
More innocent of follies
Than cool green lawns and friendly homes
And men with pipes and collies
And little girls who sit on steps
A-talking to their dollies.

The Home Run

The boy who stopped on third base to congratulate himself did not make the home run.

Methuselah

Methuselah ate what he found on his plate,
And never as people do now,
Did he note the amount of the calorie count,
He ate it because it was chow.

He wasn't disturbed as at dinner he sat,
Devouring a roast or a pie,
To think it was lacking in granular fat,
Or a couple of vitamins shy.

He cheerfully chewed each species of food,
Unmindful of troubles or fears,
Lest his health might be hurt
By some fancy dessert,
And he lived over nine hundred years.

I Am A Part

I am a part of all that I have met,
Yet all experience is an arch where through
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
Forever and for ever when I move

Tho much is taken, much abides, and though
We are not now--that strength which in the old days
Moved Earth and Heaven; that which we are, we are.

Hang Them Up

Shake out the old dreams, heart, and hang them up,
Out in the sane and comfortable sun,
They will blow dry of weeping.

When the cup of wonder spills no longer and the one who was not one, but everything is mute, emptied of vision, grave as those who die, call not your love back with some lonely flute,

Shake out your dreams and hang them out to dry.

On Growing Old

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life,
For which the first was made:

Our times are in His hand,
Who saith, "A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half, Trust God, see all,
Nor be afraid!"

Age

Age is a quality of mind
If you have left your dreams behind,
If love is cold,
If you no longer look ahead,
If your ambition's fires are dead --
Then you are old.

But if from life you take the best,
And if in life you keep the jest,
If love you hold,
No mater how the years go by,
No matter how the birthdays fly --
You are not old.

My Love

My love to all that I love;
My love to all those that love me;
My love to all those that love those that I love;
And to all those that love those that love me!

Why Should Mortals Wonder

If radio's slim fingers
Can pluck a melody
From night and toss it over
A continent or sea;

If the petaled white notes
Of a violin
Are blown across a mountain,
Or a city's din;

If songs like crimson roses,
Are plucked from thin blue air,
Why should mortals wonder,
If God hears prayer?

What You Give

It's only a memory
That you grow old.
Your body is an annual
Like marigold.

Your friends remember you the best
By deeds, not years,
By joys you scatter on the way
To banish tears.

It's not the years that count as much
As how you live.
It's not the things you got from life
But what you give!

Happiness

He can bear to die,
He who has once been happy.

Never Say Die!

Never say die, say Damn!
It isn't classic, it may be profane,
But we mortals have need of it,
Time and again.

And you'll find you'll recover
From fate's hardest slam
If you never say die, say Damn!

Great Pain

After great pain, a formal feeling comes,
The nerves sit, ceremonious, like tombs.

Grandeur

So nigh is grandeur to our dust,
So near is God to man,
When duty whispers low, thou must,
The youth replies, I can.
- - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Each Lovely Day

God let me live each lovely day,
So I may know, that come what may,
I've done my best, to live the way,
You want me to.

Forgive me if I do not pray,
In church on every Sabbath day;
The ultra-sanctimonious way,
As some folks do.

Just let me know if I should stray,
That I may stop along the way;
At any time of night or day,
And talk to You.

Progress

Toward what far end
I move, I do not know,
And just as long as I may go
On with the trend
Of things, I do not care --

Learning all that I can grasp
At anytime and anywhere,
Doing what is to be done,
From sun to sun --

Accepting gratefully the clasp
Of any joy and if pain comes,
To try to bear it gallantly
In mind and heart;

For either happiness or sorrow
Is each a part
Of growing toward a finer tomorrow --

For growing through both good and ill
Means progress, never standing still!

Vision

No vision and you perish;
No ideal, and you're lost;
Your heart must ever cherish
Some faith at any cost.

Some hope, some dream to cling to,
Some rainbow in the sky,
Some melody to sing to,
Some service that is high.

Circles

He drew a circle that shut me out,
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout,
But love and I had the wit to win,
We drew a circle that took him in!