Classic Poem

How many times that grim old phrase
Has silenced me, in childish days! —
And now — as then it did —
The phantom admonition, clear
And dominant, rings, — and I hear,
And do as I am bid.

" Go read your book! " my good old sire
Commanded, in affected ire,
When I, with querying look
And speech, dared vex his studious mind
With idle words of any kind. —
And so I read my book.

Though seldom, in that wisest age,
Did I discern on Wisdom's page
More than the task: That led
At least to thinking , and at last
To reading less, and not so fast,
And longing as I read.

And, lo! in gracious time, I grew
To love a book all through and through! —
With yearning eyes I look
On any volume, — old, maybe,
Or new — 'tis meat and drink to me. —
And so I read my book.

Old dog's-eared Readers, scarred and inked
With schoolboy hatred, long extinct; —
Old Histories that bored
Me worst of all the school; — old, worn
Arithmetics, frayed, ripped, and torn —
Now Ye are all adored.

And likewise I revere and praise
My sire, as now, with vainest gaze
And hearing, still I look
For the old face so grave yet dear —
Nay, still I see , and still I hear!
And so I read my book.

Next even to my nearest kin, —
My wife — my children romping in
From school to ride my knee, —
I love a book, and dispossess
My lap of it with loathfulness,
For all their love of me.

For, grave or gay the book, it takes
Me as an equal — calms, or makes
Me, laughing, overlook
My little self — forgetful all
Of being so exceeding small.
And so I read my book.