Classic Poem

He'd run like a cat on the ridge of the roof,
And then to give proof
Of his daredevil humour would stumble and slip
Down the slant of the slates and over the side—
While agape we would fear for the end of his slide—
But just as he seemed to shoot over the edge
His fingers would grip
The lip of the gutter or maybe the ledge
Of a top-storey window; and so he'd hang there
Cock-a-doodling and kicking his heels in the air.

And then he'd swing on to the ladder and pant
Up the slippery slant,
And take up his trowel and hawk of wet lime,
Going quietly on with the work he was at
With the same solemn face and sly rake of the hat,
As though he had worked without stopping to wink
The whole of the time,
So sober and smug that a newcomer'd think
That never a notion at all he had got
That wasn't concerned with the new chimney-pot.

And no one could guess he was wedded for life
To a slut of a wife,
And had five gaping lasses and five gaping boys
To feed and to clothe and to keep in shoe-leather,
And to scrub every Saturday night all together
At the scullery-tap with a splash-dash and squall
And the hell of a noise.
Then one dark winter morning his pride had a fall—
Tripped over his shadow, and headlong downstairs,
And ended his jests and his lardy-da airs.