Short Poems

Of this bad world the loveliest and the best
Has smiled and said "Good Night," and gone to rest

Of old when folk lay sick and sorely tried
The doctors gave them physic, and they died.
But here's a happier age: for now we know
Both how to make men sick and keep them so.

Of old, all invitations ended
With the well-known R. S. V. P.,
But now our laws have been amended
The hostess writes

Of beasts am I, of men was he most brave
Whose bones I guard, bestriding this his grave.

Och! what will we do for linen?
Says the Shan Van Vocht.
Och! what will we do for linen?
Says the Shan Van Vocht.
Och! we'll go to Enniskillen
And we'll flay an Orange villin,
And we'll wear his skin for linen,
Says the Shan Van Vocht.

Oakeley, whenas the bass you beat
In that tremendous way,
I still could fancy at your feet
A dreadful lion lay.
Askance he views the petulant scores,
But, when you touch a rib, he roars.

O son of mine, when dusk shall find thee bending
Between a gravestone and a cradle's head —
Between the love whose name is loss unending
And the young love whose thoughts are liker dread, —
Thou too shalt groan at heart that all thy spending
Cannot repay the dead, the hungry dead.

O rare Harry Parry,
When will you marry?
When apples and pears are ripe.
I'll come to your wedding
Without any bidding,
And lie with your bride all night.

O lapwing, thou fliest around the heath,
Nor seest the net that is spread beneath.
Why dost thou not fly among the corn fields?
They cannot spread nets where a harvest yields.

O money is the meat in the cocoanut,
O money is the milk in the jug;
When you've got lots of money
You feel very funny,
You're happy as a bug in a rug.