Newspaper Poetry

Author: desperaudio

  • The Good Night Kiss

    From the Grand Forks Daily Herald, February 25, 1915. By W. D. Humphrey.

    I am tired of tongues that are lying
        In their cunning schemes for gain—
    I am tired of worry and sighing
        That ravish the soul and brain—
    And I long for the peace of the wildwood
        Near the dear old home that I miss,
    And the happy trust of childhood,
        And mother’s good night kiss.

    I am tired of faces smiling
        In deceit to hide the frown—
    And life’s false joys beguiling
        The soul but to drag it down;
    And I long once more to listen
        To the sound of a step I miss—
    That I knew when the tears would glisten
        At my mother’s good night kiss.

    I am tired of all the idols
        That claim a right to my heart—
    I am tired of falsehoods’ bridles
        That are worn by all in the mart.
    And it’s ever the words that were spoken
        In truth and love that I miss—
    When each night I received their token
        In my mother’s good night kiss.

    I am tired of living and learning
        That the false exceeds the true—
    I am tired with years of yearning
        For a love like my childhood knew
    When life seemed not deceiving,
        And I dreamed it held but bliss—
    When I slept in peace believing
        In mother’s good night kiss.

  • The Old, Old Song

    From the Newark Evening Star, February 24, 1915. By Charles Kingsley.

    When all the world is young, lad,
        And all the trees are green;
    And every goose a swan, lad,
        And every lass a queen;
    Then hey for boot and horse, lad,
        And round the world away;
    Young blood must have its course, lad,
        And every dog his day.

    When all the world is old, lad,
        And all the trees are brown;
    And all the sport is stale, lad,
        And all the wheels run down;
    Creep home, and take your place there,
        The spent and maimed among;
    God grant you find one face there
        You loved when all was young.

  • Hunger

    From The Birmingham Age Herald, February 23, 1915. By Dana Burnet.

    The Starving Men they walk the dusk,
        With hunger in their eyes.
    To them a Lighted House is like
        A lamp of Paradise.

    It is the Window in the dusk
        That marks the drifter’s coast;
    It is the thought of Love and Light
        That mocks the drifter most.

    Now I have been a Starving Man
        And walked the winter dusk;
    And I have known how life may be
        A Heaven and a Husk.

    The Fainting Hands they pulled my sleeve,
        And bade me curse the Light.
    But I had seen a Rich Man’s face
        That looked into the night.

    A hungry face, a brother face,
        That stared into the gloom,
    And starved for Life and starved for Love
        Within a lighted room.

  • The Comforter

    From the Rock Island Argus, February 22, 1915. By Anne P. Field.

    Silent is the house. I sit
    In the twilight and I knit.
    At my ball of soft gray wool
    Two gray kittens gently pull—
    Pulling back my thoughts as well
    From that distant, red-rimmed hell,
    And hot tears the stitches blur
    As I knit a comforter.

    “Comforter” they call it—yet,
    Such it is for my distress,
    For it gives my restless hands
    Blessed work. God understands
    How we women yearn to be
    Doing something ceaselessly—
    Anything but just to wait
    Idly for a clicking gate!

    So I knit this long gray thing
    Which some fearless lad will fling
    Round him in the icy blast,
    With the shrapnel whistling past;
    “Comforter” it may be then,
    Like a mother’s touch again,
    And at last, not gray, but red,
    Be a pillow for the dead!

  • Confidence

    From the Evening Star, February 21, 1915. By Philander Johnson.

    The news is most discouragin’ at Pohick-on-the-Crick.
    The joy is gettin’ thinner an’ the gloom is growin’ thick.
    But underneath the willows there’s a space of ripplin’ stream
    Where the sunlight seems to sparkle with a soft, peculiar gleam.
    The birds come sweetly singin’ to the hours that drift away,
    An’ the great, big world seems peaceful an’ contented for a day.
    You toss a line an’ watch it, with your troubles all forgot,
    An’ it doesn’t make much difference if you catch a fish or not.

    The fish, of course, is mighty large on which your hope is set,
    But it keeps you interested, if a nibble’s all you get.
    Somewhere the world is strugglin’ in the darkness an’ despair,
    An’ perhaps your turn will come to land a hand an’ do your share.
    But we all have a notion that the future is secure,
    No matter what our feelin’s may be called on to endure;
    Fur some day we’ll have time to tie a string onto a stick
    An’ go a-fishin’ once again at Pohick-on-the-Crick.

  • Song of Life

    From the Grand Forks Daily Herald, February 20, 1915. By Charles Mackay.

    A traveler on a dusty road
        Strewed acorns on the lea;
    And one took root and sprouted up,
        And grew into a tree.
    Love sought its shade at even-time,
        To breathe its early vows;
    And Age was pleased, in heights of noon,
        To bask beneath its boughs.
    The dormouse loved its dangling twigs,
        The birds sweet music bore—
    It stood a glory in its place,
        A blessing ever more.

    A little spring had lost its way
        Amid the grass and fern;
    A passing stranger scooped a well
        Where weary men might turn.
    He walled it in, and hung with care
        A ladle on the brink;
    He thought not of the deed he did,
        But judged that Toil might drink.
    He passed again, and lo! the well,
        By summer never dried,
    Had cooled ten thousand parched tongues,
        And saved a life beside.

    A nameless man, amid the crowd,
        That thronged the daily mart,
    Let fall a word of hope and love,
        Unstudied from the heart—
    A whisper on the tumult thrown,
        A transitory breath,
    It raised a brother from the dust,
        It saved a soul from death.
    O germ! O fount! O word of love!
        O thought at random cast!
    Ye were but little at the first,
        But mighty at the last.

  • The Sorrowfullest Thing

    From the Newark Evening Star, February 19, 1915. By H. M.

    “This is the sorrowfullest thing to know,”
    The Persian said, “the coming of the woe,
        And have no power to stay
        The inevitable day.”

    But he who had the power to bless, and chose
    Iron and blood, and now foresees the close—
        I reckon such a king
        Earth’s sorrowfullest thing.

    He living plumbs the dark abyss of hell,
    Who shudders for the land he loves so well,
        And knows, beyond recall,
        Himself the cause of all.

  • The Girl That Mother Was

    From the Newark Evening Star, February 18, 1915. By Nancy Byrd Turner.

    When we travel back in summer to the old house by the sea
    Where long ago my mother lived, a little girl like me,
    I have the strangest notion that she still is waiting there,
    A small child in a pinafore, with a ribbon in her hair.
    I hear her in the garden when I go to pick a rose;
    She follows me along the path on dancing tipsy-toes;
    I hear her in the hayloft when the hay is slippery sweet—
    A rustle now, a scurry now, a sound of scampering feet;
    Yet though I sit as still as still, she never comes to me,
    The funny little laughing girl my mother used to be.

    Sometimes I nearly catch her as she dodges here and there,
    Her white dress fluttering round a tree or flashing up a stair;
    Sometimes I almost put my hand upon her apron strings—
    Then just before my fingers close, she’s gone again like wings.
    A sudden laugh, a scrap of song, a football on the lawn,
    And yet, no matter how I run, forever up and gone!
    A fairy or a firefly could hardly flit so fast.
    When we come home in summer, I’ve given up at last.
    Then I lay my cheek on mother’s. If there’s only one for me,
    I’d rather have her, anyway, than the girl she used to be!

  • Servant Girl and Grocer’s Boy

    From the Albuquerque Morning Journal, February 17, 1915. By Joyce Kilmer.

    Her lips’ remark was, “Oh, you kid!”
    Her soul spoke thus (I know it did):

    “O King of realms of endless joy,
    My own, my golden grocer’s boy.

    “I am a princess forced to dwell
    Within a lonely kitchen cell.

    “While you go dashing through the land
    With loveliness on every hand,

    “Your whistle strikes my eager ears
    Like music of the choiring spheres.

    “The mighty earth grows faint and reels
    Beneath your thundering wagon wheels.

    “How keenly, perilously sweet
    To cling upon that swaying seat!

    “How happy she who by your side
    May share the splendors of that ride!

    “Ah, if you will not take my hand
    And bear me off across the land,

    “Then, traveler from Arcady,
    Remain a while and comfort me.

    “What other maiden can you find
    So young and delicate and kind?”

    Her lips’ remark was, “Oh, you kid!”
    Her soul spoke thus (I know it did).

  • Soldier, Soldier

    From The Birmingham Age Herald, February 16, 1915. By Rudyard Kipling.

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        Why don’t you march with my true love?”
    “We’re fresh from off the ship an’ ‘e’s maybe give the slip,
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.

    “New love! True love!
        Best go look for a new love:
    The dead they cannot rise, an’ you’d better dry your eyes,
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
        What did you see o’ my true love?”
    “I seed ‘im serve the Queen in a suit o’ rifle green,
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        Did ye see no more o’ my true love?”
    “I seed ‘im runnin’ by when the shots began to fly—
        But you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        Did aught take ‘arm to my true love?”
    “I couldn’t see the fight, for the smoke it lay so white—
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        I’ll up an’ tend to my true love!”
    “‘E’s lying on the dead with a bullet through ‘is ‘ead,
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        I’ll down an’ die with my true love!”
    “The pit we dug’ll ‘ide ‘im an’ the twenty men beside ‘im—
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        Do you bring no sign from my true love?”
    “I bring a lock of ‘air that ‘e allus used to wear,
        An’ you’d best go look for a new love.”

    “Soldier, soldier, come from the wars,
        O then I know it’s true I’ve lost my true love!”
    “An’ I tell you truth again—when you’ve lost the feel o’ pain
        You’d best take me for your true love.”

    True love! New love!
        Best take ‘im for a new love.
    The dead they cannot rise, an’ you’d better dry your eyes,
        An’ you’d best take ‘im for your true love.