Impertinent Poems. Cooke Edmund Vance

      Did you ever make some small success

      And brag your little brag,

      As if your breathing would impress

      The world and fix your tag

      Upon it, so that all might see

      The label loudly reading, "ME!"

      And when you thought you'd gained the height

      And, sunning in your own delight,

      You preened your plumes and crowed "All right!"

      Did something wipe you out of sight?

      Unless you did this many a time

      You needn't stop to read this rime.

      When I was mamma's little joy

      And not the least bit tough,

      I'd sometimes whop some other boy

      (If he were small enough),

      And for a week I'd wear a chip,

      And at the uplift of a lip

      I'd lord it like a pigmy pope,

      Until, when I had run my rope,

      Some bullet-headed little Swope

      Would clean me out as slick as soap.

      No doubt you were as bad, or worse,

      Or else you had not read this verse.

      All women were like pica print

      When I was young and wise;

      I'd read their very souls by dint

      Of looking in their eyes.

      And in those limpid souls I'd see

      A very fierce regard for me.

      And then – my, my, it makes me faint! —

      Peroxide and a pinkish paint

      Gave me the hard, hard heart complaint,

      I saw the sham, I felt the taint,

      Yet if she'd pat me once or twice,

      I'd follow like a little fyce.

      I never played a little game

      And won a five or ten,

      But, presto! I was not the same

      As common makes of men.

      Not Solomon and all his kind

      Held half the wisdom of my mind.

      And so I'd swell to twice my size,

      And throw my hat across my eyes,

      And chew a quill, and wear red ties,

      And tip you off the stock to rise —

      Until, at last, I'd have to steal

      The baby's bank to buy a meal.

      I speak as if these things remained

      All in the perfect tense,

      And yet I don't suppose I've gained

      A single ounce of sense.

      I scoff these tales of yesterday

      In quite a supercilious way,

      But by to-morrow I may bump

      Into some newer game and jump!

      You'll think I am the only trump

      In all the deck until – kerslump!

      Unless you'll do the same some time,

      Of course you haven't read this rime.

      O, one might be like Socrates

      And lift the hemlock up,

      Pledge death with philosophic ease,

      And drain the untrembling cup; —

      But to be barefoot and be great,

      Most in desert and least in state,

      Servant of truth and lord of fate!

      I own I falter at the peak

      Trod daily by the steadfast Greek.

      O, one might nerve himself to climb

      His cross and cruelly die,

      Forgiving his betrayer's crime,

      With pity in his eye; —

      But day by day and week by week

      To feel his power and yet be meek,

      Endure the curse and turn the cheek,

      I scarce dare trust even you to be

      As was the Jew of Galilee.

      O, one might reach heroic heights

      By one strong burst of power.

      He might endure the whitest lights

      Of heaven for an hour; —

      But harder is the daily drag,

      To smile at trials which fret and fag,

      And not to murmur – nor to lag.

      The test of greatness is the way

      One meets the eternal Everyday.

      You may labor your fill, friend of mine, if you will;

      You may worry a bit, if you must;

      You may treat your affairs as a series of cares,

      You may live on a scrap and a crust;

      But when the day's done, put it out of your head;

      Don't take your troubles to bed.

      You may batter your way through the thick of the fray,

      You may sweat, you may swear, you may grunt;

      You may be a jack-fool if you must, but this rule

      Should ever be kept at the front: —

      Don't fight with your pillow, but lay down your head

      And kick every worriment out of the bed.

      That friend or that foe (which he is, I don't know),

      Whose name we have spoken as Death,

      Hovers