RILEY

SONGS OF HOME

JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

WITH PICTURES BY

WILL VAWTER

NEW YORK

GROSSET & DUNLAP

PUBLISHERS

1910

BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

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TO

GEORGE A. CARR

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CONTENTS

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RILEY SONGS OF HOME

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WE MUST GET HOME

We must get home! How could we stray like this?—

So far from home, we know not where it is,—

Only in some fair, apple-blossomy place

Of children's faces—and the mother's face—

We dimly dream it, till the vision clears

Even in the eyes of fancy, glad with tears.

We must get home—for we have been away

So long, it seems forever and a day!

And O so very homesick we have grown,

The laughter of the world is like a moan

In our tired hearing, and its song as vain,—

We must get home—we must get home again!

We must get home! With heart and soul we yearn

To find the long-lost pathway, and return!...

The child's shout lifted from the questing band

Of old folk, faring weary, hand in hand,

But faces brightening, as if clouds at last

Were showering sunshine on us as we passed.

We must get home: It hurts so staying here,

Where fond hearts must be wept out tear by tear,

And where to wear wet lashes means, at best,

When most our lack, the least our hope of rest—

When most our need of joy, the more our pain—

We must get home—we must get home again!

Seated woman with two children kneeling on the floor before her

We must get home—home to the simple things—

The morning-glories twirling up the strings

And bugling color, as they blared in blue-

And-white o'er garden-gates we scampered through;

The long grape-arbor, with its under-shade

Blue as the green and purple overlaid.

We must get home: All is so quiet there:

The touch of loving hands on brow and hair—

Dim rooms, wherein the sunshine is made mild—

The lost love of the mother and the child

Restored in restful lullabies of rain,—

We must get home—we must get home again!

The rows of sweetcorn and the China beans

Beyond the lettuce-beds where, towering, leans

The giant sunflower in barbaric pride

Guarding the barn-door and the lane outside;

The honeysuckles, midst the hollyhocks,

That clamber almost to the martin-box.

We must get home, where, as we nod and drowse,

Time humors us and tiptoes through the house,

And loves us best when sleeping baby-wise,

With dreams—not tear-drops—brimming our clenched eyes,—

Pure dreams that know nor taint nor earthly stain—

We must get home—we must get home again!

We must get home! The willow-whistle's call

Trills crisp and liquid as the waterfall—

Mocking the trillers in the cherry-trees

And making discord of such rhymes as these,

That know nor lilt nor cadence but the birds

First warbled—then all poets afterwards.

We must get home; and, unremembering there

All gain of all ambition otherwhere,

Rest—from the feverish victory, and the crown

Of conquest whose waste glory weighs us down.—

Fame's fairest gifts we toss back with disdain—

We must get home—we must get home again!

We must get home again—we must—we must!—

(Our rainy faces pelted in the dust)

Creep back from the vain quest through endless strife

To find not anywhere in all of life

A happier happiness than blest us then ...

We must get home—we must get home again!

Two boys on a farm

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JUST TO BE GOOD

Just to be good—

This is enough—enough!

O we who find sin's billows wild and rough,

Do we not feel how more than any gold

Would be the blameless life we led of old

While yet our lips knew but a mother's kiss?

Ah! though we miss

All else but this,

To be good is enough!

It is enough—

Enough—just to be good!

To lift our hearts where they are understood;

To let the thirst for worldly power and place

Go unappeased; to smile back in God's face

With the glad lips our mothers used to kiss.

Ah! though we miss

All else but this,

To be good is enough!

Woman reading to a boy

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Landscape

MY FRIEND

"He is my friend," I said,—

"Be patient!" Overhead

The skies were drear and dim;

And lo! the thought of him

Smiled on my heart—and then

The sun shone out again!

"He is my friend!" The words

Brought summer and the birds;

And all my winter-time

Thawed into running rhyme

And rippled into song,

Warm, tender, brave and strong.

And so it sings to-day.—

So may it sing alway!

Though waving grasses grow

Between, and lilies blow

Their trills of perfume clear

As laughter to the ear,

Let each mute measure end

With "Still he is thy friend."

Flowers

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Boy seated on the ground