Riley Songs of Home

Book Excerpt: ...ttle bare feet from my own mother's kneeTo foller them off to the mulberry tree.[Illustration]Leanin' up in the forks, I can see the old rail, And the boy climbin' up it, claw, tooth, and toe-nail, And in fancy can hear, as he spits on his hands, The ring of his laugh and the rip of his pants. But that rail led to glory, as certin and shoreAs I'll never climb thare by that rout' any more--What was all the green lauruls of Fame unto me, With my brows in the boughs of the mulberry tree!Then it's who can fergit the old mulberry treeThat he knowed in the days when his thoughts was as freeAs the flutterin' wings of the birds that flew outOf the tall wavin' tops as the boys come about?O, a crowd of my memories, laughin' and gay, Is a-climbin' the fence of that pastur' to-day, And, a-pantin' with joy, as us boys ust to be, They go racin' acrost fer the mulberry tree.[Illustration]FOR YOUFo