Short Poems

For every letter drink a glass,
That spells the name you fancy.
Take four, if Suky be your lass,
And five if it be Nancy.

Ah tol' Jesus it would be all right, if He changed mah name.

Jesus tol' me ah would have to live humble, if He changed mah name.

Jesus tol' me that the world would be 'gainst me, if He changed mah name.

But ah tol' Jesus it would be all right, if He changed mah name.

P HOEBUS ! to whom, upborne on sounding wings,
By the Penian spring the cygnet sings;
To whom the followers of the tuneful Nine
Their earliest and their latest lays consign;
Hail, mighty master of the warbling lyre!
Deign to accept the numbers you inspire.

M INERVA sing, o'er cities who presides,
Yet dread as Mars the storm of battle guides,
O'erturns the wall, or shouts along the plain,
Yet leads of wandering tribes the vagrant train.
Hail, goddess! to thy humble votary give,
In fortune and in happiness to live.

Plain Shepherds Wear was only Gray,
And all Sheep then were cloath'd as they,
When Shepherds 'gan to write and think,
Some Sheep stole blackness from the Ink,
And we from thence found out the skill
To make their Parchment do so still.

That good shield I threw away
beside a bush is making
some Thracian proud.
To hell
with both of them.
I'm here
and I'll get me a better one.

Rock-a-bye baby,
On the treetop;
When the wind blows,
The cradle will rock;
When the bough breaks,
The cradle will fall;
Down will come cradle,

Jenny, good spinner,
Come down to your dinner,
And taste the leg of a roasted frog!
I pray ye, good people,
Look owre the kirk steeple,
And see the cat play wi' the dog!

Mistress Mason broke a basin,
How much will it be?
Half-a-crown. Lay it down.
Out goes she!

One-ery, two-ery, dickery, Davy,
Hallabone, crackabone, tenery, Navy;
Discome, dandy, merry-come-tine,
Humbledy, bumbledy, twenty-nine,
O-U-T, out. You must go out!