By Any Other Name.

    First the teacher called the roll,
        Clos't to the beginnin',
    "Addeliney Bowersox!"
        Set the school a-grinnin'.
    Wintertime, and stingin'-cold
        When the session took up -
    Cold as we all looked at her,
        Though she couldn't look up!

    Total stranger to us, too -
        Country-folks ain't allus
    Nigh so shameful unpolite
        As some people call us! -
    But the honest facts is, then,
        Addeliney Bower-
    Sox's feelin's was so hurt
        She cried half an hour!

    My dest was acrost from her 'n:
        Set and watched her tryin'
    To p'tend she didn't keer,
        And a kind o' dryin'
    Up her tears with smiles - -tel I
        Thought, "Well, 'Addeliney
    Bowersox' is plain, but she's
        Purty as a piney!"

    It's be'n many of a year
        Sence that most oncommon
    Cur'ous name o' Bowersox
        Struck me so abomin-
    Nubble and outlandish-like! -
        I changed it to Adde-
    Liney Daubenspeck - and that
        Nearly killed her Daddy!

James Whitcomb Riley

James Whitcomb Riley was an American writer, poet, and best-selling author. He was known as the "Hoosier Poet" and the "Children's Poet" for his dialect works and children's poetry respectively. Over his career, Riley authored approximately 1,000 poems, including "Little Orphant Annie" and "The Raggedy Man". His influence extended into the 20th century, and his works continued to be celebrated for their nostalgic and rural themes.

James Whitcomb Riley

To The Quiet Observer

James Whitcomb Riley, Simple Poetry

George Mullen's Confession

James Whitcomb Riley, Simple Poetry

Noey Bixler

James Whitcomb Riley, Simple Poetry

Jack The Giant Killer.

James Whitcomb Riley, Simple Poetry

English

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Marthy Ellen.

They's nothin' in the name to strike
A feller more'n common like!
'Taint liable to git no praise
Ner nothin' like it nowadays;
An' yit that name o' her'n is jest
As purty as the purtiest -
And more 'n that, I'm here to say
I'll live a-thinkin' thataway
    And die far Marthy Ellen!

It may be I was prejudust
In favor of it from the fust -
'Cause I kin ricollect jest how
We met, and hear her mother now
A-callin' of her down the road -
And, aggervatin' little toad! -
I see her now, jes' sort o' half-
Way disapp'inted, turn and laugh
    And mock her - "Marthy Ellen!"

Our people never had no fuss,
And yit they never tuck to us;
We neighbered back and foreds some;
Until they see she liked to come
To our house - and me and h...

James Whitcomb Riley

Belle Of The Ball, The

Years, years ago, ere yet my dreams
    Had been of being wise and witty,
Ere I had done with writing themes,
    Or yawn'd o'er this infernal Chitty;
Years, years ago, while all my joy
    Was in my fowling-piece and filly:
In short, while I was yet a boy,
    I fell in love with Laura Lily.

I saw her at the county ball;
    There, when the sounds of flute and fiddle
Gave signal sweet in that old hall
    Of hands across and down the middle,
Hers was the subtlest spell by far
    Of all that set young hearts romancing:
She was our queen, our rose, our star;
    And when she danced, O Heaven, her dancing!

Dark was her hair, her hand was white;
    Her voice was exquisitely tender,
Her eyes were full of liquid light;
    I never saw a...

Winthrop Mackworth Praed

Courtin', The

God makes sech nights, all white an' still
    Fur 'z you can look or listen,
Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill,
    All silence an' all glisten.

Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown
    An' peeked in thru' the winder,
An' there sot Huldy all alone,
    'Ith no one nigh to hender.

A fireplace filled the room's one side
    With half a cord o' wood in,
There warn't no stoves (tell comfort died)
    To bake ye to a puddin'.

The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out
    Towards the pootiest, bless her,
An' leetle flames danced all about
    The chiny on the dresser.

Agin the chimbley crook-necks hung,
    An' in amongst 'em rusted
The ole queen's-arm that Gran'ther Young
    Fetched back f'om Concord busted.

The very room, c...

James Russell Lowell

The Cornflower.

    The day she came we were planting corn,
    The west eighty-acre field, -
    These prairie farms are great for size,
    And they're sometimes great for yield.

    "The new school-ma'am is up to the house,"
    The chore-boy called out to me;
    I went in wishing anyone else
    Had been put in chief trustee.

    I was to question that girl, you see,
    Of the things she ought to know;
    As for these same things, I knew right well
    I'd forgot them long ago.

    I hadn't kept track of women's ways,
    'Bout all I knew of the sex
    Was that they were mighty hard to please,
    And easy enough to vex.

    My sister Mary, who ruled my house -
    And me - with an iron hand,
    Was all the woman I knew real well -

Jean Blewett

Farmer Whipple. - Bachelor.

    It's a mystery to see me - a man o' fifty-four,
    Who's lived a cross old bachelor fer thirty year' and more -
    A-lookin' glad and smilin'!    And they's none o' you can say
    That you can guess the reason why I feel so good to-day!

    I must tell you all about it!    But I'll have to deviate
    A little in beginning so's to set the matter straight
    As to how it comes to happen that I never took a wife -
    Kind o' "crawfish" from the Present to the Springtime of my life!

    I was brought up in the country: Of a family of five -
    Three brothers and a sister - I'm the only one alive, -
    Fer they all died little babies; and 'twas one o' Mother's ways,
    You know, to want a daughter; so she took a girl to raise.

    The sweetest little thi...

James Whitcomb Riley

The Loehrs And The Hammonds

"Hey, Bud! O Bud!" rang out a gleeful call, -
"The Loehrs is come to your house!" And a small
But very much elated little chap,
In snowy linen-suit and tasseled cap,
Leaped from the back-fence just across the street
From Bixlers', and came galloping to meet
His equally delighted little pair
Of playmates, hurrying out to join him there -
"The Loehrs is come! - The Loehrs is come!" his glee
Augmented to a pitch of ecstasy
Communicated wildly, till the cry
"The Loehrs is come!" in chorus quavered high
And thrilling as some paean of challenge or
Soul-stirring chant of armied conqueror.
And who this avant courier of "the Loehrs"? -
This happiest of all boys out-o'-doors -
Who but Will Pierson, with his heart's excess
Of summer-warmt...

James Whitcomb Riley