y,
When clouds roll up and men and women pray,
And withered is the corn and grasses and grain.
The dust clings thick on every sill and pane.
A shower soon refreshes loam and clay.
The little stream resumes its cheerful hymn.
It warbles on content to sing and flow,
The music lilts and swells in happy glee;
And too, the birds and bees join in with vim,
Harmonious, alive, in twilight glow
A mighty choir of gorgeous melody!

IF YOU HEAR

If you hear the scoff of friends,
Or see their anger grow,
Just please remember this,
Perhaps they do not know.

DANCING ON A LEVEL ROAD

It is a happy thing to dance
A long a level road
So brave a deed to take a chance
Of slipping off the load.

IT WAS HOME

A little old house in a sheltered nook,
Some cottonwood trees near a babbling brook,
A sturdy gnarled oak by a grassy lane
That leads to green pastures past flowing grain.
A trellised rose bush hides a crumbling wall,
Where lovers have stood near the waterfall;
Beyond the sun sets in a golden glow
And shadows stretch far to the mead below.
A shining wire fence follows up the hill
And curves about to the graded fill.
Then back to the house in a cozy spot
We loiter there on the hallowed lot,
Where Mother's sweet face waits, in gentle calm,
And Father sits near and roads an old psalm.

QUESTIONS

If I could brush the cobwebs from my eyes,
What could I see?
If I could roll the boulder from my path,
What would I be?

DISTRUST

He walks the safest way;
There must be no thistles on his path.
He knows all men are clay.
If truth wears feathers in her cap,
They must be plucked away,
That all may proven be.

COUNTING

The morning sun casts purple in the fields,
A mocking bird sings gaily in the oaks,
White fluffy clouds rest in the murky sky.
It is yet cool, the maples scarcely stir,
But noon will burn the grasses by the way
And give the girl there at the soda fount
A welcome trade. The heat will parch the earth,
So that flowers will wilt and droop their charm.
But night will come and bring refreshing breeze
And fold a soothing mantle over all
Like mother spreading blankets over Tom.
Now day by day the summer slips on by,
Its stifling heat and gloomy skies will pass.
And winter cold will come with hoary frost;
Yet by our hearths we rest i