Tag: Philander Johnson

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.

From the Evening Star, January 23, 1915. By Philander Johnson.

A baby is the pet of fate.
    The people who draw near it
All say that it is something great
    And gather round to cheer it.

Its smiles are sought by every one;
    Its frown is viewed with terror,
And nothing it has said or done
    Is ever called an error.

Alas, these days it must forsake!
    As it is growing older,
The people who observe it make
    Their criticisms bolder.

Although in life it travels far—
    To high position, maybe—
No man can be as popular
    As when he was a baby!

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

I long to serve my native land
    With efforts intellectual.
I seek to lend a helping hand
    To struggles ineffectual.
I will appeal to wealth and ease
    And likewise to the gallery.
But first one question, if you please;
    Let’s talk about the salary.

I fain would educate mankind
    To standards altitudinous.
The manners we must leave behind
    That are considered rude in us.
This world we’ll turn into a school,
    Likewise a sanitarium;
But, touching on the golden rule,
    What is the honorarium?

From the Evening Star, November 29, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

A little nonsense now and then
Is relished by the best of men;
But so is ice cream, cake and pie.
’Tis surely a mistake to try
To make a meal of stuff that’s sweet,
Avoiding simple bread and meat.
And when a statesman is inclined
To dish up for the public mind
A mental bill of fare that’s made
Of syrup, fluff and marmalade,
The public, weary though polite,
Complains of loss of appetite
And turns away, with yearning fraught
For simple, homemade food for thought.

From the Evening Star, November 27, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

My Uncle Jim, he has a clock.
    He bought it years ago.
It used to sound a smart “tick tock,”
    But now it’s kept for show.
It used to move with nimble hands
    To count the minutes o’er,
But now its record always stands
    At strictly half-past four.

“It’s weary now,” said Uncle Jim.
    “It did its work right well;
And fading into memories dim
    Are tales it used to tell.
It sort of halted on the way
    It went so well of yore.
And, finally, it stopped one day
    Right there, at half-past four.

“That is the hour when I awoke
    To greet the dawn anew,
And next, the hour that softly spoke
    Of toiling almost through.
My old clock tells of early day
    Of the rest in store;
And so I simply let it stay
    Content at half-past four.”

From the Evening Star, November 26, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

A man and his wife in a little back room,
Who hadn’t an oil stove to lighten the gloom,
Whose children were learning to ask with a sob
The reason why father was out of a job,
Beheld from the window a well-laden dray
With gifts for the sufferers far, far away.
“I am tempted,” the woman explained, with a moan,
“To wish ourselves there, where the want is well known.”

A generous thrill sets the heart all aglow
For the sorrows of people we never may know.
Like astronomers searching the stars far away,
Regardless of earth and our own little day,
The distant and strange we would fain understand,
Regardless of problems that lie close at hand—
For instance, those folks in the little back room,
Who shiver and hunger up there in the gloom.

From the Evening Star, November 13, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

A statesman is supposed to thrill
    With utterance all intense.
He ponders day and night to fill
    The air with eloquence.
While we relate each little joke
    Or epigram serene,
Nobody tells the words he spoke
    While golfing on the green.

We dig up every anecdote
    And with it link his name.
A casual comment we will quote
    And hand it down to fame.
But when true emphasis is shed
    On the surrounding scene,
Nobody tells us what he said
    While golfing on the green.

From the Evening Star, November 6, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

Thankful fur the sunshine bright
    And thankful fur the rain;
Thankful fur the moon so white
    An’ fur the wind’s refrain!

Thankful fur the stars that shine
    When shadows gather near;
Thankful fur the friends of mine
    That gather fur good cheer!

Thankful fur the work that brings
    The rest that builds anew,
An’ made me ‘most forget the things
    Fur which my thanks are due!

From the Evening Star, October 14, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

    Oh, the man who utters warnings,
    He is busy nights and mornings!
He is busy in the north and in the south!
    He reminds us of the evil
    That attends each moth or weevil,
And is particularly eloquent on drouth.
    He will talk about the weather,
    He will get reports together
From the musty, dusty data of the past,
    And he’ll have you a-tremble,
    Till your fears you can’t dissemble,
Every time the sky is slightly overcast.
    He will take the saddest cases
    Of all history for the basis
Of a wail which to the present he’ll apply.
    All the tragedy and sorrow
    Of the ages he will borrow
And parade them with a melancholy sigh.
    We respect him while we fear him
    As we grimly pause to hear him
Giving notice of a future very blue.
    Then we conquer our dejection
    By the pertinent reflection
That the most of what he says does not come true.

From the Evening Star, October 8, 1914. By Philander Johnson.

Nobody paid attention
    To the man who gathered wealth.
Nobody paused to mention
    That his course was that of stealth,
Till he offered some donations
    For the help of human kind,
Then the fierce denunciations
    Sadly shook his peace of mind.

They said his coin was tainted
    And his motives dark and deep,
Till the pictures that they painted
    Caused him tears and loss of sleep.
Nobody ever rapped him
    While he hoarded day by day,
But, good gracious! How they slapped him
    When he gave the stuff away!