The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-11-29

And anyone can do it.
I'm prove it to YOU
When Jarvis Conk1in left
For Grigsby City just the other day
He had within his suitcase
| Six full quarts of hooch.
| For hooch is hard to come by
In Grigsby City, and what is worse,
| Compared to it.
! The back of the proverbial cat
| Is low.
! So, Jarvis started home caparisoned,
| Full panoplied and loaded.
| He looked upon the portage
AS a chore, an inconvenient
| Half-annoying chore,
| But yet a chore.
| And then the women got to talking
! They said it was a dangerous,
Foolish thing to do.
They said the wolves by stealth
| Would take it from him,
Or that the law would intervene
! And HE him to donjon keep
They talked and talked
| And Jarvis was scared stiff
| Compared to him the well-known funk
of blue
Was but II faded rag
His homeward journey was night
A grisiy episode thru which fear
| CIutched at his heart and anxiety
Pressed down upon him
AS a ton of lead.
Now, Jarvis knew his plan
Is the accepted one
That every suitcase holds
A little hooch
Had not the women talked
He would have had
No moment of uneasiness.
Why do women talk?
Having been apprised
That breakfast waited
I dressed hurriedly.
AS I did so there came to me
The murmur of voices
Deep in discussion.
The arms parley and its ramifications
Was the topic.
They talked of BRAND and his speech,
The future of France and OF Europe.
They spoke of Germany
And there was aloes
In their tones.
It was intelligent discussion, too,
Deep, sincere and fine.
But when I emerged
From the precincts of the bath,
Fresh Numbered and
Meticulously appointed
Haunting my new eravar
OF gold and brown in their faces
They asked me could they send
A suitcase by parcel post.
They didn't know,
And I couldn't tell them.
Life is like that.
If it's anything we really need to
know
The chances are
Either we've forgotten
Or we never heard
When I go home at eventide
I am a shred, a wisp,
A fragment of a man.
I've met and talked, perhaps,
With many men and sunday women.
I've done my stint;
I've given TO the lob
Whatever's mine to give.
For me the various episodes
That line my daily walk
Are fading or have faded.
The sands of conversation are run
low;
No merry jest, or quip, or jape
Springs to my lips.
I'm done out. faded and run thru.
The thing I want
Is rest and peace and quiet;
I want to NOPE. or read, or mediate
Until resilient nature
Springs to my aid,
Remove the bonds which fetter
Flesh and thought and spirit.
But there is Adelaide,
Cooped up all day
Within four narrow walls!
1t may be she's not heard
The sound of voices
Other than the shrill notes
OF peddlers
Plying to and fro along the alley.
It's like enough
No detail of the days routine
Has by its keenness
Pierced the dull monotony.
My footsteps are the beat
OF the advancing drums;
She hasn't heard and wants to know
What's happened;
Particularly she wants to know
What's happened to me.
But I am mute of voice
And void of thought.
I want to NOPE, and read, and medI-
tate.
Ny mood is low:
cannot tell her
We understand each other:
There's no censure. no repining,
But that's rock upon which
The bark of matrimony ever bears,
And not infrequently
To split upon it.
I have no gift of rhyme,
No sense of form.
But I can do vers libre