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Wit and Humor of America, The Vol 03

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<h2>A DOS'T O' BLUES</h2> <h3>BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY</h3> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I' got no patience with blues at all! And I ust to kindo talk Aginst 'em, and claim, 'tel along last Fall, They was none in the fambly stock; But a nephew of mine, from Eelinoy, That visited us last year, He kindo convinct me differunt While he was a-stayin' here. </div> <div class="stanza"> Frum ever'-which way that blues is from, They'd tackle him ever' ways; They'd come to him in the night, and come On Sundays, and rainy days; They'd tackle him in corn-plantin' time, And in harvest, and airly Fall, But a dose't of blues in the wintertime, He 'lowed, was the worst of all! </div> <div class="stanza"> Said all diseases that ever he had— The mumps, er the rheumatiz— Er ever'-other-day-aigger's bad Purt' nigh as anything is!— Er a cyarbuncle, say, on the back of his neck, Er a felon on his thumb,— But you keep the blues away from him, And all o' the rest could come! </div> <div class="stanza"> And he'd moan, "They's nary a leaf below! Ner a spear o' grass in sight! And the whole wood-pile's clean under snow! And the days is dark as night! You can't go out—ner you can't stay in— Lay down—stand up—ner set!" And a tetch o' regular tyfoid-blues Would double him jest clean shet! </div> <div class="stanza"> I writ his parents a postal-kyard, He could stay 'tel Spring-time come; And Aprile first, as I rickollect, Was the day we shipped him home! Most o' his relatives, sence then, Has either give up, er quit, Er jest died off; but I understand He's the same old color yit! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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