Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A HOOSIER CALENDAR, by JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A HOOSIER CALENDAR, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Bleak january! Cold as fate
Last Line: Recollections.
Alternate Author Name(s): Johnson Of Boone, Benj. F.
Subject(s): Nature; Seasons; Weather


JANUARY

BLEAK January! Cold as fate,
And ever colder -- ever keener --
Our very hair cut while we wait
By winds that clip it ever cleaner:
Cold as a miser's buried gold,
Or nether-deeps of old tradition --
Jeems January! you're a cold
Proposition!

FEBRUARY

You, February, -- seem to be
Old January's understudy,
But play the part too vaudeville-y, --
With wind too moist and snow too muddy --
You overfreeze and overthaw --
Your "Hos'ler Jo"-like recitation
But hints that you're, at best, a raw
Imitation.

MARCH

And, March, you've got no friends to spare --
Warm friends, I mean -- unless coal-dealers,
Or gas-well owners, pipin' where The piper's paid -- above all spielers;
You are a month, too, of complex
Perversities beyond solution --
A sort o' "loveliest of your sex"
Institution!

APRIL

But, April, when you kind o' come
A-sa'nterin' down along our roadway,
The bars is down, and we're at home,
And you're as welcome as a show-day!
First thing we know, the sunshine falls
Spring-like, and drenches all Creation
With that-'ere ba'm the poets calls
"Inspiration."

MAY

And May! -- It's warmin' jest to see
The crick thawed clear ag'in and dancin' --
'Pear-like it's tickled 'most as me
A-prancin' 'crosst it with my pants on!
And then to hear the bluebird whet
His old song up and lance it through you,
Clean through the boy's heart beatin' yet --
Hallylooya!

JUNE

June -- 'Ll, I jest git doped on June! --
The trees and grass all at their greenest --
The round earth swung 'twixt sun and moon,
Jest at its -- so to say -- serenest: --
In country, -- stars and whipperwills;
In town, -- all night the boys invadin'
Leadin' citizens' winder-sills,
Sair-a-nadin'.

JULY

Fish still a-bitin' -- some; but 'most
Too hot fer anything but layin'
Jest do-less like, and watchin' clos't
The treetops and the squirrels playin' --
Their tail-tips switched 'bove knot and limb,
But keepin' most in sequestration --
Leavin' a big part to the im-
Magination.

AUGUST

Now when it's August -- I can tell
It by a hundred signs and over; --
They is a mixed ripe-apple-smell
And mashed-down grass and musty clover;
Bees is as lazy 'most as me --
Bee-bird eats 'em -- gap's his wings out
So lazy 'at I don't think he
Spits their stings out!

SEPTEMBER

September, you appeal to all,
Both young and old, lordly and lowly;
You stuff the haymow, trough and stall,
Till horse and cow's as roly-poly
As pigs is, slopped on buttermilk
And brand, shipstuff and 'tater-peelin's --
And folks, too, feelin' fine as silk
With all their feelin's!

OCTOBER

If I'd be'n asked for my advice,
And thought the thing out, ca'm and sober --
Sizin' the months all once or twice, --
I'd la'nch'd the year out with October. . . .
All Nature then jest veiled and dressed
In weddin' gyarments, ornamented
With ripe-fruit-gems -- and kissin' jest
New-invented!

NOVEMBER

I'm 'feared November's hopes is few
And far between! -- Cold as a Monday-
Washday, er a lodge-man who
You' got to pallbear for on Sunday;
Colder and colder every day --
The fixed official time for sighin', --
A sinkin' state you jest can't stay
In, or die in!

DECEMBER

December -- why, of course we grin
And bear it -- shiverin' every minute,
Yet warm from time the month rolls in
Till it skites out with Christmas in it;
And so, for all its coldest truths
And chill, goose-pimpled imperfections,
It wads our lank old socks with Youth's
Recollections.





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