The Chronic Invalid

From The Topeka State Journal, March 2, 1914. By Roy K. Moulton.

Old Ez Binks has always been
    Sort of saller like and ailin’;
Folks cannot remember when
    Ezra’s system was not failin’.
Folks say he enjoys poor health,
    And ain’t happy less he’s sickly;
When a new disease comes out,
    Ez grabs onto it right quickly.
He’s had every known disorder
    That the doctors have invented,
And he’s nearly crossed the border
    Five times, but was just prevented.
When Ez Binks was twenty-one
    Typhoid fever nearly took him;
He got over that and then
    Chills and fever grabbed and shook him.
Chicken pox and scarlet fever
    Came, and then appendicitis,
Measles, mumps, lumbago, grip,
    Rheumatism and tonsilitis.
Ezra now is ninety-four,
    At his fate he still is railin’;
He has not improved a bit
    And his health is still failin’,
But he will keep right on livin’,
    Chronic sick folks have that way;
And it looks as though they’d have to
    Shoot old Ez on judgment day.