Town and Country

O, wifey’s in the country now,

     Out where it’s cool and nice;

Upon the hotel porch she sits

     Cool as a cake of ice.

While I am in the city hot

     With naught to content me;

Abandoned, sad, a slave to work

     As lonely as can be.

To cheer me up I dine with Jones

     At the “Good Fellows’ Club”;

(I wonder if she ever thinks

     Of her poor lonely hub?)

I lunch at “Café Jovial”,

     Where music cheers my soul;

And there to drown my grief some more,

     I float within a bowl.

And still I am so much depressed

     My spirits sunk so low

I go down to the lighted square

     And seek a burlesque show.

I buy a middle front row seat,

     (Nay, nay, my head’s not bare)

So I can better see and hear

     Of all that’s doing there.

The show is merry light and free,

     I am not quite so blue;

The jokes they cause me to forget

     They are so very new.

But when the curtain goes at last

     I’m blue again, and so

I go down to a night café

     Where warmer spirits flow.

O’ wifey’s in the country now,

     Where everything is green,

And I am in the dusty town

     It is not fair, I mean.

Of course, she’d come a flying back

     If she but knew my plight,

But I will try to bear my grief,

     And leave her in delight.

July 13, ‘10

                                               

   Emma Cone with daughter Irene and Brother Arthur Clevenshire