Category: The Topeka State Journal

From The Topeka State Journal, April 18, 1913.
By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 Bill Simms was quite a handy man at any sort of trick,
 Could tinker up a balky watch or fix a windmill quick.
 Could whittle fancy ornaments or doctor up a calf,
 Or shoe a horse with lightnin’ speed or run a phonograph.
 An artist too with chalk or brush quite wonderful was he.
 The only thing Bill couldn’t draw was just a salary.
 
 Bill Simms could make a dandy churn that surely did the work.
 Could build an automobile that would run without a jerk.
 Could make a set of bobsleighs that would always run as slick as grease.
 Could cut a pair of trousers that would always hold their crease.
 But one thing that Bill couldn’t make at all to save his life—
 He couldn’t make a livin’ fer himself and kids and wife.
 
 Bill Simms could play the violin and almost any horn,
 Could imitate each bird or beast that ever had been born.
 The folks kept him busy doin’ odd jobs and all sich.
 He had no time to settle down in order to get rich.
 His neighbors all asked favors and he never turned one down;
 And Bill spent his declinin’ years in livin’ on the town.

From The Topeka State Journal, April 12, 1913.
 By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 Abijah Binks was noted for his great array of wealth;
 In fact he had most everything excepting perfect health.
 Long years ago the doctors said that he was doomed to die,
 And nothing seemed to do him good, no matter what he’d try.
 He left off eating anything excepting breakfast food,
 He never tackled corn beef hash or anything so rude.
 A pancake made him turn away in horror and disgust;
 To starve himself to death to live, it seemed Abijah must.
 His liver was all out of whack, his nerves were all askew,
 Dyspepsia racked his feeble frame, no matter what he’d do.
 He tried mud baths and went abroad to take a famous cure,
 But still he kept on fading in a manner slow but sure.
 He licked up patent medicines for twenty years or more,
 Until he felt just like he was a corner druggist’s store.
 He ate so much digested food, he often used to say
 He somehow felt that he was just a walking bale of hay.
 With all his wealth, life held but naught for this old man forlorn;
 He often wished that he was dead or never had been born.
 One melancholy day he thought his own life he would take;
 His suicide should come about by eating sirloin steak.
 He ate a nice big juicy one and laid him down to die,
 But got up feeling quite refreshed, and then he tackled pie.
 The pie refused to take him off, and in a frenzied mood
 He ate a can of pork and beans and quit his breakfast food.
 For seven weeks, he tried and tried to kill himself that way;
 He kept on growing heavier and each succeeding day
 He took a dose of hardy food that was a little worse;
 But even sauerkraut and pickled tripe refused to call the hearse.
 At last he gave up in despair for he was growing fat.
 He kept on eating fiendish things and then decided that
 If he must live, he’d do it right and eat whatever he liked,
 And seven doctors gave him up and packed their kits and hiked.
 This happened many years ago, and Bige is eighty-one,
 And feels just like a frisky kid whose life has but begun.

From The Topeka State Journal, April 3, 1913.
 By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 He fell upon his bended knees
 And said: “Oh Agnes, wed me please.”
 He told her that she was his queen
 The grandest gal he’d ever seen
 That no one had no eyes like her’n—
 At least so fur as he could learn.
 He said he’d never seen so rare
 And gorgeous a display of hair.
 He said her figger was immense
 And hoped she wouldn’t take offense
 Because he mentioned such a thing,
 For of it poets often sing.
 He said he’d traveled all around
 And never had he heard a sound
 So musical as was her voice.
 She was his one and only choice.
 He’d give her all he had to give,
 Without her he could never live.
 No friend was by, his speech to stay.
 He wound up in the usual way.
 She gave to him her maiden heart—
 It was a cinch right from the start.
 
 For, while she let him have his say,
 He had no chance to get away.
 She had him lashed right to the mast
 And tied and shackled hard and fast.
 He didn’t know what he had said,
 He simply knew that they were wed;
 And when to breakfast she came down,
 Years later in an old house gown,
 Without a sign of curl or rat,
 And ready for the daily spat,
 He wondered how in thunder she
 Could have inspired the ecstasy
 Upon that great momentous night
 On which he made and won his fight.
 And then it percolates his brain
 As it has done time and again
 That she just had him hypnotized
 Until he raved and idolized.

From The Topeka State Journal, March 14, 1913.
 By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 I don’t want to live in Arcadia,
     Quite willingly I confess;
 The realm that the poets rave about,
     The kingdom of happiness;
 Where all is serene as a morn in Spring,
     Birds singing in every tree.
 There must be a catch in the thing somewhere.
     It doesn’t look good to me.
 
 The work in Arcadia is a cinch;
     They watch the sheep all day,
 And when they need music to while the time
     They hunt up their flutes and play.
 They work on a very peculiar plan.
     The salaries there are nil.
 No one ever saw an Arcadian
     Who had a two dollar bill.
 
 They wear sheepskin togas so very brief
     They reach only to the knees,
 And caper about in a care-free way
     No matter how chill the breeze.
 There’s nothing but happiness in that land
     With the proletariat,
 But I couldn’t ever be happy enough
     To dress in a rig like that.
 
 The life in Arcadia listens tame
     With no moving picture show,
 And never a single league bowling game,
     And never a chance to go
 And see a good circus and eat peanuts
     Or laugh at the chimpanzee.
 There may be pure joy in Arcadia,
     But this town looks good to me.

From The Topeka State Journal, March 7, 1913.
 By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 Oft in the stilly night,
     Ere slumber’s chains have bound me
 Just when I’ve neatly tucked
     The flannel blanket ‘round me,
 There comes the alarming thought,
     With possibilities dire;
 I know that I have forgot
     To fix that blamed furnace fire.
 
 I scramble out in the cold
     With every nerve fibre quaking;
 My nasal appendage is blue;
     My elbows and knees are shaking.
 I stumble o’er rugs and chairs
     And make a terrible noise
 By falling downstairs head first—
     I’ve tripped on a pile of toys.
 
 I strike a tin railroad train,
     And slide o’er the hard oak floor
 On elbows and shoulder blades;
     My head bangs against a door.
 When I reach the basement depths,
     I’m sick and I’m sore and lame,
 I open the furnace mouth
     And seek for the tongue of flame.
 
 I find that the fire’s all right;
     That it’s just as it ought to be
 To last through the entire night
     And that’s where the joke’s on me.
 I remember when it’s too late,
     As I rub each lame bruised spot,
 I’d fixed the blame thing all right—
     I’d fixed it and then forgot.

From The Topeka State Journal, March 3, 1913.
 By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 I thought that I might buy a car and zip around the countryside.
 I went to see an agent and he took me for a nice long ride.
 Somehow the news got noised around and fifteen agents called me
 And took me out in brand new cars, their points of excellence to see.
 
 This thing went all year around, and really, folks, it was immense;
 I toured all over half the state without a nickel of expense.
 Why should I own a touring car? I am not missing any fun;
 I can go riding all the time with agents who would sell me one.

From The Topeka State Journal, February 22, 1913.
 By Roy K. Moulton.
 

 I dwelt within a palace grand
 With hired help on every hand
 I ran the place at large expense
 The luxury was just immense.
 I lived on porterhouse and quail
 My chef knew no such word as “fail.”
 I had a splendid limousine
 A seven-passenger machine
 I also owned a racing car
 And there was not a thing to mar
 My peace of mind. I knew no toil
 I didn’t have to do a thing
 From spring to fall and fall to spring.
 I had no worry on my mind
 Or vain regret of any kind.
 My castle was a sight to see
 I had ten men to wait on me
 And when I got a bill, by heck,
 My secretary wrote a check.
 I lolled about and took my ease
 With bank notes piled up to my knees.
 Then something happened suddenly
 My wife came in the room and she
 Said as she gave my hair a jerk:
 “Wake up, you chump, and go to work.”