Pretending Not to See

Sometimes at the table, when

He gets misbehavin’, then

Mother calls across to me:

“Look at him, now! Do n't you see

What he's doin’, sprawlin.’ there!

Make him sit up in his chair.

Do n't you see the messy way

That he's eating?” An’ I say:

“No. He seems all right just now.

What's he doing anyhow?”

Mother placed him there by me,

An’ she thinks I ought to see

Every time he breaks the laws

An’ correct him, just because

There will come a time some day

When he must n't act that way.

But I can n't be all along

Scoldin’ him for doin’ wrong.

So if something goes astray,

I jus’ look the other way.

Mother tells me now an’ then

I'm the easiest o’ men,

An’ in dealin’ with the lad

I will never see the bad

That he does, an’ I suppose

Mother's right for Mother knows;

But I'd hate to feel that I'm

Here to scold him all the time.

Little faults might spoil the day,

So I look the other way.

Look the other way an’ try

Not to let him catch my eye,

Knowin’ all the time that he

Does n't mean so bad to be;

Knowin’, too, that now an’ then

I am not the best o’ men;

Hopin’, too, the times I fall

That the Father of us all,

Lovin’, watchin’ over me,

Will pretend He does n't see.