The Centenarian
Great Grandfather was ninety-nine And so it was our one dread, That though his health was superfine He’d fail to make the hundred. Though he was not a rolling stone No moss he seemed
The Ballad Of Gum-Boot Ben
He was an old prospector with a vision bleared and dim. He asked me for a grubstake, and the same I gave to him. He hinted of a hidden trove, and when I made
Quatrains
One said: Thy life is thine to make or mar, To flicker feebly, or to soar, a star; It lies with thee the choice is thine, is thine, To hit the ties or drive
Room 7: The Coco-Fiend
I look at no one, me; I pass them on the stair; Shadows! I don’t see; Shadows! everywhere. Haunting, taunting, staring, glaring, Shadows! I don’t care. Once my room I gain Then my life
Dyspeptic Clerk
I think I’ll buy a little field, Though scant am I of pelf, And hold the hope that it may yield A living for myself; For I have toiled ten thousand days With ledger
Comrades
Oh bear with me, for I am old And count on fingers five The years this pencil I may hold And hope to be alive; How sadly soon our dreaming ends! How brief the
Leaves
The leaves are falling one and one, Each like a life to me, As over-soonly in the sun They spiral goldenly: So airily and warily They falter free. The leaves are falling two and
Fidelity
Being a shorty, as you see, A bare five footer, The why my wife is true to me Is my six-shooter. For every time a guy goes by Who looks like a lover, I
The Shooting Of Dan McGrew
A bunch of the boys were whooping it up in the Malamute saloon; The kid that handles the music-box was hitting a jag-time tune; Back of the bar, in a solo game, sat Dangerous
The Spirit Of The Unborn Babe
The Spirit of the Unborn Babe peered through the window-pane, Peered through the window-pane that glowed like beacon in the night; For, oh, the sky was desolate and wild with wind and rain; And
My Garret
Here is my Garret up five flights of stairs; Here’s where I deal in dreams and ply in fancies, Here is the wonder-shop of all my wares, My sounding sonnets and my red romances.
Two Children
Give me your hand, oh little one! Like children be we two; Yet I am old, my day is done That barely breaks for you. A baby-basket hard you hold, With in it cherries
The Low-Down White
This is the pay-day up at the mines, when the bearded brutes come down; There’s money to burn in the streets to-night, so I’ve sent my klooch to town, With a haggard face and
The Tramps
Can you recall, dear comrade, when we tramped God’s land together, And we sang the old, old Earth-song, for our youth was very sweet; When we drank and fought and lusted, as we mocked
The Quest
I sought Him on the purple seas, I sought Him on the peaks aflame; Amid the gloom of giant trees And canyons lone I called His name; The wasted ways of earth I trod: