Poems by James Whitcomb Riley

All Poems Original Poems Translations

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To A Boy Whistling

The smiling face of a happy boy

With its enchanted key

Is now unlocking in memory

My store of heartiest joy.

And my lost life again to-day,

In pleasant colors all aglow,

From rainbow tints, to pure white snow,

Is a panorama sliding away.

James Whitcomb Riley

There Was A Cherry-Tree

There was a cherry-tree. Its bloomy snows

Cool even now the fevered sight that knows

No more its airy visions of pure joy —

As when you were a boy.

There was a cherry-tree. The Bluejay sat

His blue against its white — O blue as jet

He seemed there then!— But now — Whoever knew

He was so pale a blue!

James Whitcomb Riley

Where Shall We Land

"_Where shall we land you, sweet_?"--Swinburne.

All listlessly we float

Out seaward in the boat

That beareth Love.

Our sails of purest snow

Bend to the blue below

And to the blue above.

Where shall we land?

James Whitcomb Riley

A Noon Interval

A deep, delicious hush in earth and sky —

A gracious lull—since, from its wakening,

The morn has been a feverish, restless thing

In which the pulse of Summer ran too high

And riotous, as though its heart went nigh

To bursting with delights past uttering:

Now—as an o'erjoyed child may cease to sing

All falteringly at play, with drowsy eye

James Whitcomb Riley

Our Hired Girl

Our hired girl, she's 'Lizabuth Ann;

An' she can cook best things to eat!

She ist puts dough in our pie-pan,

An' pours in somepin' 'at's good an' sweet;

An' nen she salts it all on top

With cinnamon; an' nen she'll stop

An' stoop an' slide it, ist as slow,

In th' old cook-stove, so's 'twon't slop

James Whitcomb Riley

The Bumblebee

You better not fool with a Bumblebee! —

Ef you don't think they can sting — you'll see!

They're lazy to look at, an' kind o' go

Buzzin' an' bummin' aroun' so slow,

An' ac' so slouchy an' all fagged out,

Danglin' their legs as they drone about

The hollyhawks 'at they can't climb in

'Ithout ist a-tumble-un out ag'in!

James Whitcomb Riley

The Old Times Were The Best

Friends, my heart is half aweary

Of its happiness to-night:

Though your songs are gay and cheery,

And your spirits feather-light,

There's a ghostly music haunting

Still the heart of every guest

And a voiceless chorus chanting

That the Old Times were the best.

James Whitcomb Riley

The Old Guitar

Neglected now is the old guitar

And moldering into decay;

Fretted with many a rift and scar

That the dull dust hides away,

While the spider spins a silver star

In its silent lips to-day.

The keys hold only nerveless strings—

The sinews of brave old airs

James Whitcomb Riley

The Rapture Of The Year

While skies glint bright with bluest light

Through clouds that race o'er fields and town,

And leaves go dancing left and right,

And orchard apples tumble down;

While school-girls sweet, in lane or street,

Lean 'gainst the wind and feel and hear

Its glad heart like a lover's beat,—

So reigns the rapture of the year.

James Whitcomb Riley

A Barefoot Boy

A barefoot boy! I mark him at his play —

For May is here once more, and so is he, —

His dusty trousers, rolled half to the knee,

And his bare ankles grimy, too, as they:

Cross-hatchings of the nettle, in array

Of feverish stripes, hint vividly to me

Of woody pathways winding endlessly

Along the creek, where even yesterday

James Whitcomb Riley

Unless

Who has not wanted, does not guess

What plenty is.—Who has not groped

In depths of doubt and hopelessness,

Has never truly hoped.—

Unless, sometimes, a shadow falls

Upon his mirth, and veils his sight,

And from the darkness drifts the light

Of love at intervals.

James Whitcomb Riley

The Harper

Like a drift of faded blossoms

Caught in a slanting rain,

His fingers glimpsed down the strings of his harp

In a tremulous refrain:

Patter and tinkle, and drip and drip!

Ah! but the chords were rainy sweet!

And I closed my eyes and I bit my lip,

As he played there in the street.

James Whitcomb Riley