THE hired man we knew of yore Deserves to come to life once more; Deserves, although the nations rage, To step again upon the stage And show, if not his knightly grace, His kinship with the human race: 'Twould seem 'twere well jest now to scan The fast receding hired man. In youth I met along my way A dozen hired men a day; I've seen him hunted up and hired, I've seen him fussed at, fit and fired; I've seen him rise to some renown And get to represent the town; The Strafford Free Will Church began Through preaching by a hired man. With him I've wheeled the woodpile in And fished where fish was awful thin; I knew his boots, I knew his cough, I've touched the pay that payed him off; I have a diary that he kept And own a bed on which he slept, The which, now scraped of much japan, Would quite enrich that hired man. I've also seen him disappear What time the sheriff's gig drew near; I've went with dad that very night Beyond the woods and left a light, A loaf of bread and dollar bill, Where he, perhaps, was hiding still; But no; he scorned our helpful plan— He cooked a sheep, that hired man. But most of them was straight and neat And paid their bills and scraped their feet; One used to even wash the eggs, One dusted off the grinstone legs; Two tracked acrost the kitchen floor, Two should have helped the old folks more, Three owned a colt and one a span— You see I've seen a hired man. One day I read a book that told About the Norman knights of old, And next day when we cut the swale I tipped the hired man the tale; "The Normans!" said he, "Oh! get out, You mean the Mormans past a doubt— Old Brigham Young and all his clan— A bad book," said the hired man. And though we had our troubles then We should have pensioned hired men; I asked a Chink to-day jest how He'd go to work to milk a cow, And quick as morphine he replied, "To milkum cow me get inside:" 'Tis well, indeed, at times to scan The past and present hired man. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...CONTRA MORTEM: THE WHEEL OF BEING II by HAYDEN CARRUTH MARSHALL WASHER by HAYDEN CARRUTH TO KNOW IN REVERIE THE ONLY PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE ABSOLUTE by HAYDEN CARRUTH GUARDIANSHIP by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY: JOHN WASSON by EDGAR LEE MASTERS |