Читать книгу: «Mother Goose for Grown Folks», страница 7

UP A TREE

 
"Oh dear, what can the matter be?
Two old women got up in an apple-tree:
One came down,
And the other stayed up till Saturday."
 
 
I suppose you wonder how it should be
That two old ladies got up in a tree:
Did you never chance the exploit to see?
Perhaps you have noticed pussy-cat go,
With a wrathful look, and a way not
slow,
And a tail very big, and a back up—
so?
 
 
Well, that is the type of the thing I mean;
And the apple-bearer, since earth was
green,
The tree of our trouble hath always been.
 
 
So when "human warious" fails to agree,
There stands the old stem of iniquity,
And one or both will be "up a tree."
 
 
Each in her style: some are stately and
stiff;
Some hiss and spit, and are up in a whiff;
And some hunch along in a moody miff.
 
 
It does n't much matter, however it be;
The best of people may get up the tree;
The question is, when they 'll come down,
you see!
 
 
An offenseless one will descend straightway;
One half in the wrong for a while may stay;
Clear curstness will roost till the judgment
day!
 

THE CROOKED MAN

 
"There was a crooked man,
And he went a crooked mile;
He found a crooked sixpence
Against a crooked stile:
He bought a crooked cat,
Which caught a crooked mouse;
And they all lived together
In a little crooked house."
 
 
Once begin with a crook,
You 'll go on with a crook;
Crooked ways, crooked luck, crooked peo-
ple.
Crooked eyes, crooked mind,
Crooked guideposts will find;
Yes, a crook in the very church-steeple!
 
 
The first mile you make
The initial will take
For all the long leagues that shall follow:
Right and left, fork and swerve,
Any turn that will serve,
Up and down, betwixt hummock and hol-
low.
 
 
If you pause at a stile
Or a fence for a while,
Some twist must compel or invite you:
Even sin, I've a doubt,
Were it straight out and out,
Could hardly persuade or delight you.
 
 
And a shave, or a bend,
Or a nick, must commend,
For you, every quarter and nickel:
Right pure from the mint,
There were no magic in't
Your trick-loving finger to tickle.
 
 
Crooked money will buy
But a crook or a lie,
Whatever the ware that you deal in
Your position in life,
Your companions, your wife,
Or even a playfellow feline
 
 
And as thief catches thief
In the common belief,
Be the creature a cat or a woman,
The crooked shall still
Find the crooked at will,
And you 'll see the old saw sayeth true, man.
In kin, neighbors, house,
In a servant or mouse,
She will always put paw on her likeness:
The same rule runs through,
For the false and the true,—
Straight to straight, and oblique to oblique-
ness.
 
 
So together, you see,
As you build, you shall be,
Every line of the mould in the casting;
And a nice little world
You 'll have made, when you 've
curled
And squirmed to your state everlasting!
 

THE FOUR WINDS

 
"When the wind is in the east,
'T is neither good for man nor beast;
When the wind is in the north,
The skillful fisher goes not forth;
When the wind is in the south,
It blows the bait in the fishes' mouth;
When the wind is in the west,
Then't is at the very best."
 
 
Life, like the earth, to the east doth run,
Turning her face to the face of the sun.
The wind that is contrary, as she goes,
Is always the bitterest wind that blows;
Smiting the kiss of the shining away,
And beating backward the beautiful day.
The wind that comes from the icy pole
Shutteth up hope in the human soul;
Chiding the heart, and forbidding the will,
And blasting our very beginnings with ill.
Oh, the wind of the north, on its terrible
path,
Is the wind of wreck, and despair, and
wrath!
 
 
The breath that blows from the climes of
ease,
From the isles of spice and the bread-fruit
trees,
With its unearned flavors to fill the mouth;
The zephyr that sends from the idle south
Its soft beguiling and treacherous touch,—
Let the soul in her struggle be shy of
such!
 
 
But the wind that springs from the hind-
ward side,
And as earth rolls under sweeps over the
tide;
The gust that is vigorous, brave, and true,
Backing you up in whatever you do,
Keen and impelling, the wind of the west,—
Ah, well saith the legend, that breeze is the
best.
 

THE PIPER AND THE COW

 
"There was a piper had a cow,
And he had naught to give her:
So he took up his pipes, and he played her a tune,
Consider, cow,—consider!
The cow considered very well,
And gave the piper a penny;
And bade him play the other tune,—
Corn-rigs are bonny."
 
 
Good folks of the pen, I am sure you 'll
agree
That author and publisher here we may see:
The Piper plays tunes 'twixt the world and
the Cow,
And he has, at the same time, the care of
the mow:
When the crop in the barn shows but little
to feed her,
 
 
To the Cow quoth the Piper, Consider, con-
sider!
The Cow is a creature that cheweth the cud;
Recalleth the hill-sides, with daisies be-
stud,
The sweet running waters, the breezes at
play,
While mournfully munching the last lock of
hay:
All the world that she knoweth of fra-
grance and stir
Sealeth up in those dry stems its juices for
her.
 
 
So it cometh, forsooth, that because she can
chew
People think it is all she can hunger to do:
Neither Public nor Piper doth fully allow
For the interdependence of mood and of
mow,
Or see how perplexing it may be, alas,
For a Oow to consider between hay and
grass!
 
 
Howbeit, if Mooly considereth well,
And giveth the Piper good milk for to sell,
The Piper he maketh his own modest
penny,—
Just one at a time, till he hath a great
many;
And during the while this is coming to pass
Fresh fodder grows plenty, and delicate
grass.
 
 
Once more life's a pasture; the season is
June;
The pipes play up cheerly the bonny-rig
tune;
The Cow is in clover; the buttercups hold
Right up to her chin their probation of
gold;
But she knows, all the same, how't will be
when they bid her
The next year, as last year, Consider, con-
sider!
 

BEHIND THE LOG

 
"Pussy sits behind the log; how can she be fair?
Then comes in the little dog: Pussy, are you there?
So, so, dear mistress pussy, pray tell me how you do!
I thank you, little dog, I am very well just now."
 
 
Behind the log, in the reek and mould,
How many poor things are there,
Who else might be sought, and caressed,
and told,
So tenderly, they were fair!
 
 
Behind the log, ah, behind the log,
Such only can tell us how
They are glad of a word from a little dog
Who pauses to say Bow-wow!
 

SHOE AND FIDDLE

 
"Cock-a-doodle-doo!
My dame has lost her shoe;
My master's lost his fiddlestick,
And does n't know what to do."
 
 
Who's crowing, I wonder, to spread such
a scandal
Of the blithe-tripping dame who hath
dropped off her sandal,
And seemeth all sad and forlornly to
shirk,
Where she used, in good hmnor, to dance
at her work?
 
 
Perhaps honest chanticleer simply may
glory
In faithfully giving both sides of the story;
And scorning the loss of the lady to tell
Without owning the miss of the master as
well.
 
 
For how, when the fiddlestick 's gone, can
be played
The music, without which the dancing is
stayed?
When the man 's out of tune, the dear
woman, 't is plain,
Must wait till he graciously strikes up again.
Let him hunt for his bow, then, and rosin it
too,
(If really he'd like to be told what to do;)
And I think, with the fiddling, 't will surely
be found
All else will come right for the merry-go-
round!
 

SWING, SWONG!

 
"Swing, Swong!
The days are long!
Up hill, and down dale;
Butter is made in every vale."
 
 
Your day will come, though it arrive but
slowly;
There 's cream in all life, set however
lowly;
And if, as Goose philosophy, you doubt
it,
Hear what the little hen found out about
it:—
 
 
"Kroo! kroo! I've cramp in my legs,
Sitting so long atop of my eggs;
Never a minute for rest to snatch;
I wonder when they are going to hatch!
 
 
Cluck! cluck! listen! sleep!
Down in the nest there's a stir and a
peep.
Everything comes to its luck some day;
I've got chickens! What will folks say?"
 

SHUTTLECOCK

 
"Here we go up, up, up,
And here we go down, down, downy;
Here we go backward and forward,
And here we go round, round, roundy."
 
 
Battledore and shuttlecock!
Hither, and thither, and yon:
Never a flight without a knock,
And so the world goes on.
 
 
Shuttlecock and battledore!
When will it all be done,—
The life of the buffet and beat be o'er,
And the life of the wings begun?
 

THE MAN IN THE WILDERNESS

 
"The man in the wilderness, he asked me
How many strawberries grew in the sea:
I answered him, as I thought good,
As many red herrings as grew in the wood."
 
 
Of the face of the world they have found
it out
By what they must fetch and do;
Of the heart of the world they dispute and
doubt,
And yet it is just as true.
 
 
Your fish is wholesome, and live, and clean,
And my little fruit is fair;
Though the earth's good Maker might never
mean
That both should be everywhere.
 
 
And all for the want of a thought like this,
It comes, and it can but be,
That many a soul 's in the wilderness,
And many adrift at sea.
 

PRAE AND POST

 
"The man in the moon
Came down too soon
To inquire the way to Norwich;
The man in the south,
He burnt his mouth
With eating cold plum porridge."
 
 
The moony men are always in a hurry
That puts sedater people in a flurry,
They get their theories through other media
Than facts of gazetteer or cyclopaedia;
And then, by some unknown, preposterous
gateway,
Rush forth to claim the realizing straight-
way.
 
 
Just think of lighting on a foreign planet,
Asking for Norwich before folks began it!
 
 
But then, those sleepy souls at the equator
Lose just as much, you see, by starting
later;
Never strike in while anything is hot,—
Wait till the porridge is all out o' the
pot;—
And through their indolence and easy fool-
ing
Burn their mouths, figuratively, in the cool-
ing!
 
 
Too soon, too slow, there's nothing comes
out even;
The very sun that travels through the
heaven
Heels o'er the line, now this way and now
that,
And only twice a year can hit it pat.
Even your two eyes make a parallax,
And might mislead you on two different
tracks;
Between them both, the moral, I suppose,
Is that each man should follow his own
nose!
 

QUITE CONTRARY

 
"Mistress Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And tulips, all of a row."
 
 
Prithee, tell me, Mistress Mary,
Whence this rhyme of "quite contrary"?
Why should Mother Goose, beholding
All these pleasant blooms unfolding,—
Every prim and pretty border
Standing in such shining order,—
Looking o'er the lovely rows,
Ask you "how your garden grows"?
 
 
Mary, so precise and chary,
Are you, anyhow, contrary?
While these sweetly perfect lines
Nod their gentle countersigns,
Spending all your strength on this,
Lest the least thing grow amiss,
Weareth some unseen parterre
Quite a different kind of air?
 
 
Through your hating of a weed
Runs there any ill to seed,—
Thistle-blow of petulance,
Bitter blade of blame, perchance,
Or a flaunting stem of pride,
In that other garden-side?
Mary, in our women-hearts
Spring such curious counterparts!
 
 
Each her home-plot watching wary,
Lest the faultless order vary
By the dropping of a leaf,
Or a blossom come to grief
From the blasting of the storm,
Or the eating of a worm,
Let us both be certain, Mary,
Nothing dearer goes contrary!