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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/5332-8.txt b/5332-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1cbff43 --- /dev/null +++ b/5332-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1122 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor, by Wallace Irwin + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor + +Author: Wallace Irwin + +Release Date: March, 2004 [EBook #5332] +Last Updated: August 22, 2012 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE SONNETS *** + + + + +Produced by David Schwan + + + + + + +THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR + +By Wallace Irwin + + Author of + The Love Sonnets of a Hoodlum + The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, Junior + Etc. + + + + With a harmless and instructive Introduction + by + Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger + + Professor of Literary Bi-Products + University of Monte Carlo + + +Paul Elder & Company + +San Francisco and New York + + Muse of my native land, + am I inspir'd? + --Keats. + + + +Copyright, 1908 + +by Paul Elder and Company + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +Science may conquer the stars, but it does nothing by jumps. As a +Scientist, as well as a philosopher, I am accustomed to reaching the +Transcendental by winding paths. It is characteristic of me that I +should have consented to preface this remarkable Sonnet Cycle only after +supreme deliberation, and that I should at last have determined to speak +in behalf of the Car Conductor for the following reasons: + +1. As a Botanist I am fascinated by the phenomenon of Genius flourishing +from bud to flower, from flower to seed. + +2. As a Psychologist I am anxious to establish once and for all, both by +plano-inductive and precoordinate systems of logic, the Status of Slang. + +What position does Slang occupy in the thought of the world? Let us turn +to Zoology for an answer. + +No traces of Slang may be found among mollusks, crustaceans or the lower +invertebrates. Slang is not common to vertebrate fishes or to whales, +seals, reptiles or anthropoid apes--in a word, slang-speaking is +nowhere prevalent among lower animals. It may, then, be definitely and +clearly asserted that Slang is the natural, logical expression of the +Human Race. If Man, then, is the highest of created mammals, is not his +natural speech (Slang) the highest of created languages? It is generally +conceded that Literature is the most exalted expression of Language. +Would not the Literature, then, which employs the highest of created +languages (Slang) be the supreme Literature of the world? + +By such logical, irrefutable, inductive steps have I proven not only the +Status of Slang, but the literary importance of these Sonnets which it +is at once my scientific duty and my esthetic pleasure to introduce. + +The twenty-six exquisite Sonnets which form this Cycle were written, +probably, during the years 1906 and 1907. Their author was William Henry +Smith, a car conductor, who penned his passion, from time to time, on +the back of transfer-slips which he treasured carefully in his hat (1). +We have it from no less an authority than Professor Sznuysko that the +Car Conductor usually performed these literary feats in public, writing +between fares on the rear platform of a Sixth Avenue car. Smith's +devotion to his Musa Sanctissima was often so hypnotic, I am told, that +he neglected to let passengers on and off--nay, it is even held by some +critics that he occasionally forgot to collect a fare. But be it said to +his undying honor that his Employers never suffered from such +carelessness, for it was the custom of our Poet to demand double fares +from the old, the feeble and the mentally deficient. + +Even as the illimitable ichor of star-dust, the mysterious Demiurge of +the Universe, keeps the suns and planets to their orbitary revolutions, +so must environment mark the Fas and Nefas of Genius. Plato's Idea of +the Archetypal Man was due, perhaps, as much to the serene weather +conditions of Academe as to the marvelous mentality of Plato. What had +Job eaten for breakfast that he should have given utterance to his +magnificent Lamentation? Was he the discoverer of Human Sorrow or the +pioneer of Human Dyspepsia? + +It is not altogether radical on my part, then, for me to assert that +many of the stylistic peculiarities found in these Sonnets are +attributable to the locale of their inspiration the rear platform of a +Sixth Avenue car. One can plainly hear the jar and jounce of the +elliptical wheels, the cry, "Step lively!" the six o'clock stampede, the +lament of the strap-hanging multitude in such lines as these: + + "Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, + Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. + I rubber vainly at the throng to see + Her golden locks--gee! such a discontent! + Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent--" + +Where are lines like these to be found in the Italian of Petrarch? Where +has Tasso uttered an impassioned confession to resemble this: + + "But when I ogle Pansy in the throng + My heart turns over twice and rings a gong"? + +Of the human or personal record of William Henry Smith very little has +been discovered. Looking over the books of the Metropolitan Street +Railway I unearthed the following entry: + +"Nov. 1, 1907:" + +"W. H. Smith, conductor, discharged." + +"Remarks:--Car No. 21144, William Smith, conductor, ran into large +brewery truck at So. E. cor. Sixth Ave. It is reported that Smith, to +the neglect of his duty, was reading poetry from a book called 'Sonnets +of de Heredia' at the time of the accident. Three Italians were slightly +injured by the accident, and Ethelbert Pangwyn, an actor starring in +'The Girl and the Idiot,' a musical comedy, was killed." + +"Smith was held for manslaughter, but Judge O' Rafferty, who had seen +'The Girl and the Idiot,' discharged the defendant, averring that the +killing of Pangwyn did not constitute a crime." + +What, then, has become of this minstrel who sang the Minnelieder of the +Car-barns? Like Homer, like Omar, like Sappho, like Shakespeare, he is a +Voice singing out of the mists. He was but a Name to his employers; and +his friends, if he has friends, remember him not. These Sonnets, written +neatly on twenty-six violet transfer-slips, were discovered, together +with a rejection blank from a leading magazine, in the Dead Letter +office. According to the current folk-lore in Harlem and the Bronx, +Smith is now living in California employed as a brakeman on the Southern +Pacific Railroad. Some aver that Pansy fell heiress to a sausage +establishment and moved to Italy with her Poet. Still others maintain +that Pansy, Gill the Grip and Maxy the Firebug never existed in real +life--were merely the mind-children of a Symbolist and a dreamer of +dreams. + +To the latter theory I incline at a scholarly angle. This Cycle may be +taken, perhaps, not so much as a living record of human experience as a +lofty parable sounding the key-note of all human life. Gill the Grip is +the Iago, the Mefistofele, the symbolism of a malevolent destiny. Maxy +the Firebug may be the Poet's interpretation of the Social Unrest, of +Doubt, of progressive irresponsibility. Would it be going too far, then, +to say that Pansy stands to us as the symbol of Pan-girlism--as an +almost Anacreontic yearning for the type? Or may not these Sonnets be +taken, in a way, as a modern Vita Nuova wherein a Sixth Avenue Alighieri +calls to his Beatrice and mourns within when, + +"Pansy-girl refuses to occur?" + +So much for the Poet and his Purpose. Should any one of the readers of +this Cycle doubt the enduring greatness of the lines, let him consider +that I, Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger, have seen fit to introduce them +to immortality. + + + (1) Since the salary-books of the Metropolitan Street + Railways show, during the year 1906, 182 conductors named + Smith in their employ, 38 of whom were named William Smith + and 12 William Henry Smith, it is easy for the reader to + conceive my task in establishing the identity of our Poet. + W. C. A. + + + + + +THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR + + + + +PROLOGUE + + + Did some one ask if I am on the job? + I sure am to the pay-roll with my lay, + A hot tabasco-poultice which will stay + Close to the ribs and answer throb-to-throb. + Here have I chewed my Music from the cob + And followed Passion from the get-away + Past the big Grand Stand where the Pousse-Café + Christens my Muse as Jennie-on-the-Daub. + + Hark ye, all marks who break the Pure Fool Law, + How I, the Windy Wonder of the Age, + Have fought the Tender Passion to a draw + And got my mug upon the Sporting Page, + Since Love and I collided at the curve + And left me with a Dislocated Nerve. + + + + +I + + + + Am I in bad? upon the tick of nine + Today the Pansy got aboard my ship + And sprung the Trans-Suburban for a trip. + Say, she's the shapely ticket pretty fine! + Next to her pattern Anna Held looks shine + And Lilly Russell doesn't know the grip. + But oh! she's got a deep ingrowing tip + That she must shy at honks like yours and mine. + + I says to her, "Fare, please!" out loud like that, + But she pipes, "Fade, Bill, fade! you pinched my fare." + That get-back tripped your Oswald to the mat, + And yet I yelled, "Cough up here, Golden Hair!" + Eh, what? I got the zing from Pansy's orb + Which says, "Dry out now, Shorty,--please absorb!" + + + + +II + + + + A True McGlook once handed this to me: + When little Bright Eyes cuts the cake for you + Count twenty ere you eat the honey-goo + Which leads to love and matrimony--see? + A small-change bunk what's bats on spending free + Can't four-flush when he's paying rent for two. + The pin to flash on Cupid is 'Skidoo!' + The call for Sweet Sixteen is "23." + + But say! Life looks goshawful on the stretch + Without a Ray of Sunshine in my flat, + With no one there to call me "Handsome wretch," + And dust the fuzz and mildew off my hat. + If she was waiting at the church tonight + You'd find me there with wedding-bells all right! + + + + +III + + + + Pansy got on at Sixteenth Street last night, + And some one flipped a handspring in my heart. + She snickered once, "Oh look, here's Mr. Smart!" + Was I there Henry Miller? guess you're right! + I did the homerun monologue as bright + As any scrub that ever learned the art. + I plum forgot the signals, "Stop" and "Start!" + And almost wrecked the car once--guess I might! + + I took one Mike six blocks beyond the place + He flagged for his. He got as red as ham + And yodelled through his apopleptic face, + "I think you're dips!" I says, "I know I am--" + When Pansy starts to send a wireless wave + She simply just can't make her eyes behave! + + + + +IV + + + + On every car there's always one fat coot + What goes to sleep and dreams he's paid his fare. + And when you squeak he gets the Roosevelt glare, + And hoots, "I won't be dickied with--I'll shoot!" + Then all the passengers get in and root. + Loud cheers of, "Put him off!" and "Make him square!" + Till Mr. Holdfast with an injured air + Pungles his nick and ends the bum dispute. + + It's ever thus on this here rolling ball-- + You've got to pop your coin to ride so far. + The yap that kicks and rings a deadhead call + Must either spend or else get off the car. + On Life's Street Railway wealth may cut the cheese, + But Death rings up and says, "Step lively, please!" + + + + +V + + + + "There'll be some fancy steps at Car-Barn Hall," + Gilly the Gripman pipes me off today, + "This won't be any gabberfest--for say! + Nix but the candy goes to this here ball. + You've got to flash your union card, that's all, + To circulate the maze with Tessie May, + And all the Newport push out Harlem way + Will slip on wax till sunrise,--do you call?" + + I told him that I pulled the gong for that! + If Pansy would be there 'twas was Me for It. + I'd burnish up my buttons, mop my hat, + Polish my pumps and blow in for a hit. + "All to the Fritz," says Gill, "if you get jolly + Around the curves--you're apt to slip your trolley!" + + + + +VI + + + + The lemon-wagon rumbled by today + And dropped me off a sour one--are you on? + I went and gave the boss a cooney con + About the Car-Barn Kick--what did he say? + "Back to your platform, Clarence light and gay, + Jingle the jocund fares, nor think upon + The larks of Harry Lehr or Bath House John, + For they are It and you are still on pay." + + So I have been sky-prancing all night long + A-dragging car-conductors and their queens + Clad in their laughing-robes to join the throng + That makes the Car-Barn function all the beans. + And say! I had a brainstorm just last trip + When I took Pansy's fare from Gill the Grip. + + + + +VII + + + + At Midnight when I got a gasp for lunch + I mushed it for the Car-Barns just to lamp + And see the Creamy Charlies do the vamp + And swing their Fancy Floras in the crunch. + I piped my Pansy in among the bunch + And asked her would she mix it with the Champ, + Wouldn't she like to join me in a stamp? + She saw me first and stopped me with a punch. + + I saw her hook a loop with Gill the Grip, + With Pinky Smith and Handsome Hank she heeled; + With all the dossy bunks she took a skip + Each time the German tune-professor spieled. + But nix with me the lightsome toe she sprung-- + As Caesar said to Cassius, "Ouch! I'm stung!" + + + + +VIII + + + + Forsooth that was a passing lusty clout + That chopped me off with Pansy--don't you fret! + There's quite a blaze inside my garret yet, + And all the Dipper Corps can't put it out. + Gilly the Grip's a pretty ricky tout-- + Under the old rag-rug for him, you bet, + When I put on my Navajo and get + One license to unloose my soul and shout. + + Perhaps he thinks I'm old Molasses Freight + Sidetracked at Pokey Pond and filled with prunes + Waiting for Congress to appropriate + The nuggets draped around me in festoons. + Wait till I ticket Pansy, then I guess + Slow Freight will switch to Honeymoon Express! + + + + +IX + + + + Today I gave a serenade to Gill; + I says, "To put it pleasant you're a screech, + Your smile would shoo the seagulls off the beach, + Your face would give Vesuvius a chill. + You're just what Mr. Shakespeare calls 'a pill + Trying to keep company with a peach.' + Now, if you want to answer with a speech, + Open your trap at once, or else lie still." + + But when I handed Gill the Grip this cluster + He simply clamped his language-mill down tight, + Strangled his guff and acted rather fluster + Although I'm sure I spoke to him polite. + I guess that Mr. Gilly ain't the kind + That understands when people talk refined. + + + + +X + + + + Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, + Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. + I rubber vainly at the throng to see + Her golden locks--gee! such a discontent! + Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent-- + Perhaps she's promised Gill the Grip to be + His No. 1 till Death tolls "23!" + While I am Outsky in the supplement. + + Now and anon some Lizzie flags the train + And I, poor dots, cry, "Rapture, it is her!" + Yet guess again--my hope is all in vain + And Pansy girl refuses to occur. + If this keeps up I think I'll finish swell + Among the jabbers in a padded cell. + + + + +XI + + + + My Trolley hikes to Harlem p.d.q., + And picks up pikers all along the beat. + At six o'clock the aisles are full of feet, + The straps with fingers, and the entire zoo + Boils on the platform with a mad huroo + Reckless as Bronx mosquitoes after meat. + The widow stands, the fat man gets the seat + And Satan smiles like Foxy M. Depew. + + And as we hikes along I thinks, thinks I, + "The human race is like the ocean foam, + Roaring and discontented, peevish, fly--" + Say, why in blazes don't they stay to home? + This travel-sickness is a danger which + Keeps hoboes poor and corporations rich. + + + + +XII + + + + Today I piped my future Ma-in-law. + She got aboard my Pullman and she scared + Three babies into fits the way she glared. + Rattle my baggage if I ever saw + A cracker-box to equal Mother's jaw, + A hardwood-finish face all nailed and squared. + She ossified the gripman when she stared-- + And me? Well, I was overcame with awe. + + But, being Pansy's Ma, 't was up to me + To hand her something pit-a-pat and swell, + And so I says, "Hello, Queen Cherokee! + What ho! for Pansy? hope she's feeling well." + And Ma responds, a trifle tart but game, + "She minds her bizness--hope you feel the same." + + + + +XIII + + + + I don't think Mother chalked me out to win, + To be the steady of her darling child. + She thinks I am a kick-up, something wild, + And no sweet girl should wear my college pin. + She thinks I'm some too piffly with my chin + And my soft prattle simply gets her riled. + I've lost my keys with her, to put it mild, + I don't belong, because I am not In. + + Say how, with such an iceberg on the track, + Can I conduct my car to married bliss? + I hoped that I could whistle Pansy back, + And lo! I got a frostbite off of this! + I'd wrastle Death for Her, I'd fight her Pa,-- + But stab me if I'll syrup to her Ma! + + + + +XIV + + + + E'en as I stood with cobwebs in my tower + A candy vision came and flagged the boat-- + Give forty rah-rah-rahs! O joy, O gloat! + 'Twas Pansy like a fairy in a bower + Warbling, "Hi, stop the car!" With all my power + I yanked the bell. My brain was all afloat, + My heart cut pin-wheels, stole a base at throat, + Sang "Tammany"--and knighthood was in flower. + + I helped her on. My shoes were full of feet. + I says, "How's Ma?" She answers, "Going some." + I doffed my lid and ventured to repeat + The breeze had put the weather on the bum. + Then she replied, not seeming sore or vexed, + "It may not be so punk on Sunday next." + + + + +XV + + + + The Sinful Rich go whizzing by all day + In wealthy wagons, looking pert and swell; + They get the ride, the Commons get the smell + And full of thought and microbes wend their way. + Maxy the Firebug says that Mammon's sway + Is stringing Virtue to a fare-ye-well, + But wait, he says, till Labor with a yell + Soaks Mam a crack forninst the vertebray. + + The Rich, says Max, are simply dips and yeggs + That lift the headlight beads from yaps like us; + They pinch your pie, sew up our ham and eggs + And leave us minus all that they are plus. + The world, says Max, belongs to me and Bill + And Mrs. Casey--whoa! let's roll a pill! + + + + +XVI + + + + At Mrs. Casey's hunger-killing shop + Whither I hie thrice daily for my stew, + I dream I'm Mr. Waldorf as I chew + My prunes or lay my Boston-baked on top. + Growley and sinkers, slum and mutton sop, + India-rubber jelly known as "glue," + A soup-bone goulash with a spud or two, + Clatter below until I signal "Stop!" + + There may be chefs in France or Albany + Can knock a poem from a wedge of pie; + But just give me a check on Mrs. C., + For rapid-filling ballast, murmurs I. + Kings may prefer some tasty wads of hash, + But they don't feed at fifteen cents per crash! + + + + +XVII + + + + Pansy and me for Coney Sunday noon + To see a perfect lady bump the bumps; + We rubbered at the lions with the chumps + And took the Wellman special to the moon. + She asks me, "Dance?" I answers, "Just as soon," + And so we clutched and whirled into the gumps, + But every time I went to stir my stumps + They stuck like gum-drops to a macaroon. + + "I could die dancing, Danny!" murmurs she. + (I gambolled on her corns, she hollered, "Don't!") + "I could die dancing also" (this from me), + "But if you'll pass me up, I guess I won't." + Just then some lemon-sport observed my glide + And warbled, "Slide, you frozen chicken, slide!" + + + + +XVIII + + + + I next sprung Pansy for a four-bit feed-- + It was a giddy tax, but what care I? + We shot the bill-of-fare from soup to pie + And lemonade (that cost an extra seed). + "You're the cute plunge," says Pans', and I agreed + That at a spenderfest I wasn't shy,-- + That when it came to rolling nickels by, + Willie the Cowboy was a perfect bleed. + + She said that Thomas Lawson on a lark + Would faint away to see the way I blew; + She said I'd be the whizz in Central Park, + And Ready Cash to me seemed very few. + I asked her, Did she need a Valentine? + And she responded, "You're the pink for mine!" + + + + +XIX + + + + We took the iron-clad wave-tub home at ten, + And as we sat conversing on the deck + A certain Hester-street spaghetti-neck + Pipes through the darkness, "Who's yer ladyfren'?" + There might have been a hoe-down there and then + (That war-ship never came so near a wreck); + The dog-eye boy got just as pale as heck + And made a duck behind the trenches, when-- + + Pansy boiled up and clamped me by a flip. + "Nixie the kindergarten!" murmurs she. + "Gents," I replied out loud, "Get off the ship + And walk, or else nail down that repartee. + This yard of lace I'm holding, so to speak, + Is pinned on tight--or will be in a week." + + + + +XX + + + + A-lopping on a car-barn bench I spied + Gilly the Grip, quite recent this p.m., + Just like a lily on a broken stem + Or like a Salt Lake buck without a bride. + "Chirk, Gilly, chirk!" I says in tones of pride, + "Perhaps this unhinged heart is just pro tem. + The world is full of pompadours for them + That keep their search-lights peeled from side to side." + + But Gill remarked, "Eh, what? Say, I'm so slow + I couldn't catch the hour-hand on a clock. + I'm simply stationary as they grow;. + A lamp-post race could beat me round the block. + You needn't think you're such an Alfred G., + To motor by a quarry-cart like me!" + + + + +XXI + + + + Next week the wedding-bells won't do a thing, + For I'll be there, I guess, to fill the set, + And Pansy's Ma, she won't be late, you bet, + To see the Reverend Mr. pull the string. + Me for a spike-tailed scabbard and a ring, + A shell-back shirt, forsooth a peacherette. + I'll be the daintiest bridegroom ever yet; + Nothing to do but take the count, then--bing! + + Love in a cottage run on union pay-- + Can Teddy Roosevelt do a sum like that? + Two can eat cheap as one, perhaps, but say, + You've got to beat a quarter pretty flat + To cork three squares, make Little Two Shoes snug + And keep the Wolf from chewing up the rug. + + + + +XXII + + + + Methinks I'm tagged to join the Worry Club, + To chase the fleeting rhino through the gloom, + To bag the boodle, trap the wild mazume + And scratch for corn when Pansy hollers "Grub!" + They say I'll turn as sickly as a chub + When on the First, with dull and deadly boom, + The Rent comes round and walks into the room, + Remarking, "Peel or else file out, you scrub!" + + But when your arms are full of girl and fluff + You hide your nerve behind a yard of grin; + You'd spit into a wild cat's face or bluff + A flock of dragons with a safety pin. + Life's a slow skate, but Love's the dopey gum + That puts a brewery horse in racing trim. + + + + +EPILOGUE + + + + Kind reader, when you 'phone don't ask for me + Enquiring how a Flossie should be won-- + There isn't any Rule Book, are you on? + And Queenie can't be coaxed by recipee. + Some girls like hard-luck music, minor key, + Some like the Gas-car Gussie act, hot ton, + Others are simply fierce for Jolly John + Who loves to make a noise like repartee. + + None but the Nerve, say I, deserves the Fair, + And stony hearts can't stand up long to chin. + If Willie-on-the-doormat lingers there + The chances are he'll be Invited In. + Up against Love the Candy Kid is nix; + The Porous Plaster wins because it sticks + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor, by +Wallace Irwin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE SONNETS *** + +***** This file should be named 5332-8.txt or 5332-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/3/5332/ + +Produced by David Schwan + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor + +Author: Wallace Irwin + +Release Date: March, 2004 [EBook #5332] +Last Updated: January 26, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE SONNETS *** + + + + +Produced by David Schwan and David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Wallace Irwin + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <blockquote> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Author of + The Love Sonnets of a Hoodlum + The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, Junior + Etc. +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + With a harmless and instructive Introduction + by + Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger + + Professor of Literary Bi-Products + University of Monte Carlo +</pre> + <p> + Paul Elder & Company + </p> + <p> + San Francisco and New York + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Muse of my native land, + am I inspir'd? + —Keats. +</pre> + <p> + Copyright, 1908 + </p> + <p> + by Paul Elder and Company + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p class="toc"> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_INTR"> INTRODUCTION </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PROL"> PROLOGUE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> I </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> II </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> III </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> IV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> V </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> VI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> VII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> VIII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> IX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> X </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> XI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> XII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> XIII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> XIV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> XV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0019"> XVI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0020"> XVII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0021"> XVIII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0022"> XIX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0023"> XX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0024"> XXI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0025"> XXII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_EPIL"> EPILOGUE </a> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_INTR" id="link2H_INTR"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + INTRODUCTION + </h2> + <p> + Science may conquer the stars, but it does nothing by jumps. As a + Scientist, as well as a philosopher, I am accustomed to reaching the + Transcendental by winding paths. It is characteristic of me that I should + have consented to preface this remarkable Sonnet Cycle only after supreme + deliberation, and that I should at last have determined to speak in behalf + of the Car Conductor for the following reasons: + </p> + <p> + 1. As a Botanist I am fascinated by the phenomenon of Genius flourishing + from bud to flower, from flower to seed. + </p> + <p> + 2. As a Psychologist I am anxious to establish once and for all, both by + plano-inductive and precoordinate systems of logic, the Status of Slang. + </p> + <p> + What position does Slang occupy in the thought of the world? Let us turn + to Zoology for an answer. + </p> + <p> + No traces of Slang may be found among mollusks, crustaceans or the lower + invertebrates. Slang is not common to vertebrate fishes or to whales, + seals, reptiles or anthropoid apes—in a word, slang-speaking is + nowhere prevalent among lower animals. It may, then, be definitely and + clearly asserted that Slang is the natural, logical expression of the + Human Race. If Man, then, is the highest of created mammals, is not his + natural speech (Slang) the highest of created languages? It is generally + conceded that Literature is the most exalted expression of Language. Would + not the Literature, then, which employs the highest of created languages + (Slang) be the supreme Literature of the world? + </p> + <p> + By such logical, irrefutable, inductive steps have I proven not only the + Status of Slang, but the literary importance of these Sonnets which it is + at once my scientific duty and my esthetic pleasure to introduce. + </p> + <p> + The twenty-six exquisite Sonnets which form this Cycle were written, + probably, during the years 1906 and 1907. Their author was William Henry + Smith, a car conductor, who penned his passion, from time to time, on the + back of transfer-slips which he treasured carefully in his hat (1). We + have it from no less an authority than Professor Sznuysko that the Car + Conductor usually performed these literary feats in public, writing + between fares on the rear platform of a Sixth Avenue car. Smith's devotion + to his Musa Sanctissima was often so hypnotic, I am told, that he + neglected to let passengers on and off—nay, it is even held by some + critics that he occasionally forgot to collect a fare. But be it said to + his undying honor that his Employers never suffered from such + carelessness, for it was the custom of our Poet to demand double fares + from the old, the feeble and the mentally deficient. + </p> + <p> + Even as the illimitable ichor of star-dust, the mysterious Demiurge of the + Universe, keeps the suns and planets to their orbitary revolutions, so + must environment mark the Fas and Nefas of Genius. Plato's Idea of the + Archetypal Man was due, perhaps, as much to the serene weather conditions + of Academe as to the marvelous mentality of Plato. What had Job eaten for + breakfast that he should have given utterance to his magnificent + Lamentation? Was he the discoverer of Human Sorrow or the pioneer of Human + Dyspepsia? + </p> + <p> + It is not altogether radical on my part, then, for me to assert that many + of the stylistic peculiarities found in these Sonnets are attributable to + the locale of their inspiration the rear platform of a Sixth Avenue car. + One can plainly hear the jar and jounce of the elliptical wheels, the cry, + "Step lively!" the six o'clock stampede, the lament of the strap-hanging + multitude in such lines as these: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, + Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. + I rubber vainly at the throng to see + Her golden locks—gee! such a discontent! + Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent—" +</pre> + <p> + Where are lines like these to be found in the Italian of Petrarch? Where + has Tasso uttered an impassioned confession to resemble this: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "But when I ogle Pansy in the throng + My heart turns over twice and rings a gong"? +</pre> + <p> + Of the human or personal record of William Henry Smith very little has + been discovered. Looking over the books of the Metropolitan Street Railway + I unearthed the following entry: + </p> + <p> + "Nov. 1, 1907:" + </p> + <p> + "W. H. Smith, conductor, discharged." + </p> + <p> + "Remarks:—Car No. 21144, William Smith, conductor, ran into large + brewery truck at So. E. cor. Sixth Ave. It is reported that Smith, to the + neglect of his duty, was reading poetry from a book called 'Sonnets of de + Heredia' at the time of the accident. Three Italians were slightly injured + by the accident, and Ethelbert Pangwyn, an actor starring in 'The Girl and + the Idiot,' a musical comedy, was killed." + </p> + <p> + "Smith was held for manslaughter, but Judge O' Rafferty, who had seen 'The + Girl and the Idiot,' discharged the defendant, averring that the killing + of Pangwyn did not constitute a crime." + </p> + <p> + What, then, has become of this minstrel who sang the Minnelieder of the + Car-barns? Like Homer, like Omar, like Sappho, like Shakespeare, he is a + Voice singing out of the mists. He was but a Name to his employers; and + his friends, if he has friends, remember him not. These Sonnets, written + neatly on twenty-six violet transfer-slips, were discovered, together with + a rejection blank from a leading magazine, in the Dead Letter office. + According to the current folk-lore in Harlem and the Bronx, Smith is now + living in California employed as a brakeman on the Southern Pacific + Railroad. Some aver that Pansy fell heiress to a sausage establishment and + moved to Italy with her Poet. Still others maintain that Pansy, Gill the + Grip and Maxy the Firebug never existed in real life—were merely the + mind-children of a Symbolist and a dreamer of dreams. + </p> + <p> + To the latter theory I incline at a scholarly angle. This Cycle may be + taken, perhaps, not so much as a living record of human experience as a + lofty parable sounding the key-note of all human life. Gill the Grip is + the Iago, the Mefistofele, the symbolism of a malevolent destiny. Maxy the + Firebug may be the Poet's interpretation of the Social Unrest, of Doubt, + of progressive irresponsibility. Would it be going too far, then, to say + that Pansy stands to us as the symbol of Pan-girlism—as an almost + Anacreontic yearning for the type? Or may not these Sonnets be taken, in a + way, as a modern Vita Nuova wherein a Sixth Avenue Alighieri calls to his + Beatrice and mourns within when, + </p> + <p> + "Pansy-girl refuses to occur?" + </p> + <p> + So much for the Poet and his Purpose. Should any one of the readers of + this Cycle doubt the enduring greatness of the lines, let him consider + that I, Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger, have seen fit to introduce them + to immortality. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + (1) Since the salary-books of the Metropolitan Street + Railways show, during the year 1906, 182 conductors named + Smith in their employ, 38 of whom were named William Smith + and 12 William Henry Smith, it is easy for the reader to + conceive my task in establishing the identity of our Poet. + W. C. A. +</pre> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR + </h1> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PROL" id="link2H_PROL"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PROLOGUE + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Did some one ask if I am on the job? + I sure am to the pay-roll with my lay, + A hot tabasco-poultice which will stay + Close to the ribs and answer throb-to-throb. + Here have I chewed my Music from the cob + And followed Passion from the get-away + Past the big Grand Stand where the Pousse-Café + Christens my Muse as Jennie-on-the-Daub. + + Hark ye, all marks who break the Pure Fool Law, + How I, the Windy Wonder of the Age, + Have fought the Tender Passion to a draw + And got my mug upon the Sporting Page, + Since Love and I collided at the curve + And left me with a Dislocated Nerve. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Am I in bad? upon the tick of nine + Today the Pansy got aboard my ship + And sprung the Trans-Suburban for a trip. + Say, she's the shapely ticket pretty fine! + Next to her pattern Anna Held looks shine + And Lilly Russell doesn't know the grip. + But oh! she's got a deep ingrowing tip + That she must shy at honks like yours and mine. + + I says to her, "Fare, please!" out loud like that, + But she pipes, "Fade, Bill, fade! you pinched my fare." + That get-back tripped your Oswald to the mat, + And yet I yelled, "Cough up here, Golden Hair!" + Eh, what? I got the zing from Pansy's orb + Which says, "Dry out now, Shorty,—please absorb!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A True McGlook once handed this to me: + When little Bright Eyes cuts the cake for you + Count twenty ere you eat the honey-goo + Which leads to love and matrimony—see? + A small-change bunk what's bats on spending free + Can't four-flush when he's paying rent for two. + The pin to flash on Cupid is 'Skidoo!' + The call for Sweet Sixteen is "23." + + But say! Life looks goshawful on the stretch + Without a Ray of Sunshine in my flat, + With no one there to call me "Handsome wretch," + And dust the fuzz and mildew off my hat. + If she was waiting at the church tonight + You'd find me there with wedding-bells all right! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Pansy got on at Sixteenth Street last night, + And some one flipped a handspring in my heart. + She snickered once, "Oh look, here's Mr. Smart!" + Was I there Henry Miller? guess you're right! + I did the homerun monologue as bright + As any scrub that ever learned the art. + I plum forgot the signals, "Stop" and "Start!" + And almost wrecked the car once—guess I might! + + I took one Mike six blocks beyond the place + He flagged for his. He got as red as ham + And yodelled through his apopleptic face, + "I think you're dips!" I says, "I know I am—" + When Pansy starts to send a wireless wave + She simply just can't make her eyes behave! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + On every car there's always one fat coot + What goes to sleep and dreams he's paid his fare. + And when you squeak he gets the Roosevelt glare, + And hoots, "I won't be dickied with—I'll shoot!" + Then all the passengers get in and root. + Loud cheers of, "Put him off!" and "Make him square!" + Till Mr. Holdfast with an injured air + Pungles his nick and ends the bum dispute. + + It's ever thus on this here rolling ball— + You've got to pop your coin to ride so far. + The yap that kicks and rings a deadhead call + Must either spend or else get off the car. + On Life's Street Railway wealth may cut the cheese, + But Death rings up and says, "Step lively, please!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "There'll be some fancy steps at Car-Barn Hall," + Gilly the Gripman pipes me off today, + "This won't be any gabberfest—for say! + Nix but the candy goes to this here ball. + You've got to flash your union card, that's all, + To circulate the maze with Tessie May, + And all the Newport push out Harlem way + Will slip on wax till sunrise,—do you call?" + + I told him that I pulled the gong for that! + If Pansy would be there 'twas was Me for It. + I'd burnish up my buttons, mop my hat, + Polish my pumps and blow in for a hit. + "All to the Fritz," says Gill, "if you get jolly + Around the curves—you're apt to slip your trolley!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The lemon-wagon rumbled by today + And dropped me off a sour one—are you on? + I went and gave the boss a cooney con + About the Car-Barn Kick—what did he say? + "Back to your platform, Clarence light and gay, + Jingle the jocund fares, nor think upon + The larks of Harry Lehr or Bath House John, + For they are It and you are still on pay." + + So I have been sky-prancing all night long + A-dragging car-conductors and their queens + Clad in their laughing-robes to join the throng + That makes the Car-Barn function all the beans. + And say! I had a brainstorm just last trip + When I took Pansy's fare from Gill the Grip. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + At Midnight when I got a gasp for lunch + I mushed it for the Car-Barns just to lamp + And see the Creamy Charlies do the vamp + And swing their Fancy Floras in the crunch. + I piped my Pansy in among the bunch + And asked her would she mix it with the Champ, + Wouldn't she like to join me in a stamp? + She saw me first and stopped me with a punch. + + I saw her hook a loop with Gill the Grip, + With Pinky Smith and Handsome Hank she heeled; + With all the dossy bunks she took a skip + Each time the German tune-professor spieled. + But nix with me the lightsome toe she sprung— + As Caesar said to Cassius, "Ouch! I'm stung!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VIII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Forsooth that was a passing lusty clout + That chopped me off with Pansy—don't you fret! + There's quite a blaze inside my garret yet, + And all the Dipper Corps can't put it out. + Gilly the Grip's a pretty ricky tout— + Under the old rag-rug for him, you bet, + When I put on my Navajo and get + One license to unloose my soul and shout. + + Perhaps he thinks I'm old Molasses Freight + Sidetracked at Pokey Pond and filled with prunes + Waiting for Congress to appropriate + The nuggets draped around me in festoons. + Wait till I ticket Pansy, then I guess + Slow Freight will switch to Honeymoon Express! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IX + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Today I gave a serenade to Gill; + I says, "To put it pleasant you're a screech, + Your smile would shoo the seagulls off the beach, + Your face would give Vesuvius a chill. + You're just what Mr. Shakespeare calls 'a pill + Trying to keep company with a peach.' + Now, if you want to answer with a speech, + Open your trap at once, or else lie still." + + But when I handed Gill the Grip this cluster + He simply clamped his language-mill down tight, + Strangled his guff and acted rather fluster + Although I'm sure I spoke to him polite. + I guess that Mr. Gilly ain't the kind + That understands when people talk refined. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + X + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, + Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. + I rubber vainly at the throng to see + Her golden locks—gee! such a discontent! + Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent— + Perhaps she's promised Gill the Grip to be + His No. 1 till Death tolls "23!" + While I am Outsky in the supplement. + + Now and anon some Lizzie flags the train + And I, poor dots, cry, "Rapture, it is her!" + Yet guess again—my hope is all in vain + And Pansy girl refuses to occur. + If this keeps up I think I'll finish swell + Among the jabbers in a padded cell. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XI + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + My Trolley hikes to Harlem p.d.q., + And picks up pikers all along the beat. + At six o'clock the aisles are full of feet, + The straps with fingers, and the entire zoo + Boils on the platform with a mad huroo + Reckless as Bronx mosquitoes after meat. + The widow stands, the fat man gets the seat + And Satan smiles like Foxy M. Depew. + + And as we hikes along I thinks, thinks I, + "The human race is like the ocean foam, + Roaring and discontented, peevish, fly—" + Say, why in blazes don't they stay to home? + This travel-sickness is a danger which + Keeps hoboes poor and corporations rich. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Today I piped my future Ma-in-law. + She got aboard my Pullman and she scared + Three babies into fits the way she glared. + Rattle my baggage if I ever saw + A cracker-box to equal Mother's jaw, + A hardwood-finish face all nailed and squared. + She ossified the gripman when she stared— + And me? Well, I was overcame with awe. + + But, being Pansy's Ma, 't was up to me + To hand her something pit-a-pat and swell, + And so I says, "Hello, Queen Cherokee! + What ho! for Pansy? hope she's feeling well." + And Ma responds, a trifle tart but game, + "She minds her bizness—hope you feel the same." +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XIII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + I don't think Mother chalked me out to win, + To be the steady of her darling child. + She thinks I am a kick-up, something wild, + And no sweet girl should wear my college pin. + She thinks I'm some too piffly with my chin + And my soft prattle simply gets her riled. + I've lost my keys with her, to put it mild, + I don't belong, because I am not In. + + Say how, with such an iceberg on the track, + Can I conduct my car to married bliss? + I hoped that I could whistle Pansy back, + And lo! I got a frostbite off of this! + I'd wrastle Death for Her, I'd fight her Pa,— + But stab me if I'll syrup to her Ma! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XIV + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + E'en as I stood with cobwebs in my tower + A candy vision came and flagged the boat— + Give forty rah-rah-rahs! O joy, O gloat! + 'Twas Pansy like a fairy in a bower + Warbling, "Hi, stop the car!" With all my power + I yanked the bell. My brain was all afloat, + My heart cut pin-wheels, stole a base at throat, + Sang "Tammany"—and knighthood was in flower. + + I helped her on. My shoes were full of feet. + I says, "How's Ma?" She answers, "Going some." + I doffed my lid and ventured to repeat + The breeze had put the weather on the bum. + Then she replied, not seeming sore or vexed, + "It may not be so punk on Sunday next." +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XV + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The Sinful Rich go whizzing by all day + In wealthy wagons, looking pert and swell; + They get the ride, the Commons get the smell + And full of thought and microbes wend their way. + Maxy the Firebug says that Mammon's sway + Is stringing Virtue to a fare-ye-well, + But wait, he says, till Labor with a yell + Soaks Mam a crack forninst the vertebray. + + The Rich, says Max, are simply dips and yeggs + That lift the headlight beads from yaps like us; + They pinch your pie, sew up our ham and eggs + And leave us minus all that they are plus. + The world, says Max, belongs to me and Bill + And Mrs. Casey—whoa! let's roll a pill! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0019" id="link2H_4_0019"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XVI + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + At Mrs. Casey's hunger-killing shop + Whither I hie thrice daily for my stew, + I dream I'm Mr. Waldorf as I chew + My prunes or lay my Boston-baked on top. + Growley and sinkers, slum and mutton sop, + India-rubber jelly known as "glue," + A soup-bone goulash with a spud or two, + Clatter below until I signal "Stop!" + + There may be chefs in France or Albany + Can knock a poem from a wedge of pie; + But just give me a check on Mrs. C., + For rapid-filling ballast, murmurs I. + Kings may prefer some tasty wads of hash, + But they don't feed at fifteen cents per crash! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XVII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Pansy and me for Coney Sunday noon + To see a perfect lady bump the bumps; + We rubbered at the lions with the chumps + And took the Wellman special to the moon. + She asks me, "Dance?" I answers, "Just as soon," + And so we clutched and whirled into the gumps, + But every time I went to stir my stumps + They stuck like gum-drops to a macaroon. + + "I could die dancing, Danny!" murmurs she. + (I gambolled on her corns, she hollered, "Don't!") + "I could die dancing also" (this from me), + "But if you'll pass me up, I guess I won't." + Just then some lemon-sport observed my glide + And warbled, "Slide, you frozen chicken, slide!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XVIII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + I next sprung Pansy for a four-bit feed— + It was a giddy tax, but what care I? + We shot the bill-of-fare from soup to pie + And lemonade (that cost an extra seed). + "You're the cute plunge," says Pans', and I agreed + That at a spenderfest I wasn't shy,— + That when it came to rolling nickels by, + Willie the Cowboy was a perfect bleed. + + She said that Thomas Lawson on a lark + Would faint away to see the way I blew; + She said I'd be the whizz in Central Park, + And Ready Cash to me seemed very few. + I asked her, Did she need a Valentine? + And she responded, "You're the pink for mine!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XIX + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + We took the iron-clad wave-tub home at ten, + And as we sat conversing on the deck + A certain Hester-street spaghetti-neck + Pipes through the darkness, "Who's yer ladyfren'?" + There might have been a hoe-down there and then + (That war-ship never came so near a wreck); + The dog-eye boy got just as pale as heck + And made a duck behind the trenches, when— + + Pansy boiled up and clamped me by a flip. + "Nixie the kindergarten!" murmurs she. + "Gents," I replied out loud, "Get off the ship + And walk, or else nail down that repartee. + This yard of lace I'm holding, so to speak, + Is pinned on tight—or will be in a week." +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XX + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A-lopping on a car-barn bench I spied + Gilly the Grip, quite recent this p.m., + Just like a lily on a broken stem + Or like a Salt Lake buck without a bride. + "Chirk, Gilly, chirk!" I says in tones of pride, + "Perhaps this unhinged heart is just pro tem. + The world is full of pompadours for them + That keep their search-lights peeled from side to side." + + But Gill remarked, "Eh, what? Say, I'm so slow + I couldn't catch the hour-hand on a clock. + I'm simply stationary as they grow;. + A lamp-post race could beat me round the block. + You needn't think you're such an Alfred G., + To motor by a quarry-cart like me!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XXI + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Next week the wedding-bells won't do a thing, + For I'll be there, I guess, to fill the set, + And Pansy's Ma, she won't be late, you bet, + To see the Reverend Mr. pull the string. + Me for a spike-tailed scabbard and a ring, + A shell-back shirt, forsooth a peacherette. + I'll be the daintiest bridegroom ever yet; + Nothing to do but take the count, then—bing! + + Love in a cottage run on union pay— + Can Teddy Roosevelt do a sum like that? + Two can eat cheap as one, perhaps, but say, + You've got to beat a quarter pretty flat + To cork three squares, make Little Two Shoes snug + And keep the Wolf from chewing up the rug. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0025" id="link2H_4_0025"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XXII + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Methinks I'm tagged to join the Worry Club, + To chase the fleeting rhino through the gloom, + To bag the boodle, trap the wild mazume + And scratch for corn when Pansy hollers "Grub!" + They say I'll turn as sickly as a chub + When on the First, with dull and deadly boom, + The Rent comes round and walks into the room, + Remarking, "Peel or else file out, you scrub!" + + But when your arms are full of girl and fluff + You hide your nerve behind a yard of grin; + You'd spit into a wild cat's face or bluff + A flock of dragons with a safety pin. + Life's a slow skate, but Love's the dopey gum + That puts a brewery horse in racing trim. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_EPIL" id="link2H_EPIL"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + EPILOGUE + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Kind reader, when you 'phone don't ask for me + Enquiring how a Flossie should be won— + There isn't any Rule Book, are you on? + And Queenie can't be coaxed by recipee. + Some girls like hard-luck music, minor key, + Some like the Gas-car Gussie act, hot ton, + Others are simply fierce for Jolly John + Who loves to make a noise like repartee. + + None but the Nerve, say I, deserves the Fair, + And stony hearts can't stand up long to chin. + If Willie-on-the-doormat lingers there + The chances are he'll be Invited In. + Up against Love the Candy Kid is nix; + The Porous Plaster wins because it sticks +</pre> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor, by +Wallace Irwin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE SONNETS *** + +***** This file should be named 5332-h.htm or 5332-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/3/5332/ + +Produced by David Schwan and David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor + +Author: Wallace Irwin + +Release Date: March, 2004 [EBook #5332] +Last Updated: August 22, 2012 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE SONNETS *** + + + + +Produced by David Schwan + + + + + + +THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR + +By Wallace Irwin + + Author of + The Love Sonnets of a Hoodlum + The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Junior + Etc. + + + + With a harmless and instructive Introduction + by + Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger + + Professor of Literary Bi-Products + University of Monte Carlo + + +Paul Elder & Company + +San Francisco and New York + + Muse of my native land, + am I inspir'd? + --Keats. + + + +Copyright, 1908 + +by Paul Elder and Company + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +Science may conquer the stars, but it does nothing by jumps. As a +Scientist, as well as a philosopher, I am accustomed to reaching the +Transcendental by winding paths. It is characteristic of me that I +should have consented to preface this remarkable Sonnet Cycle only after +supreme deliberation, and that I should at last have determined to speak +in behalf of the Car Conductor for the following reasons: + +1. As a Botanist I am fascinated by the phenomenon of Genius flourishing +from bud to flower, from flower to seed. + +2. As a Psychologist I am anxious to establish once and for all, both by +plano-inductive and precoordinate systems of logic, the Status of Slang. + +What position does Slang occupy in the thought of the world? Let us turn +to Zoology for an answer. + +No traces of Slang may be found among mollusks, crustaceans or the lower +invertebrates. Slang is not common to vertebrate fishes or to whales, +seals, reptiles or anthropoid apes--in a word, slang-speaking is +nowhere prevalent among lower animals. It may, then, be definitely and +clearly asserted that Slang is the natural, logical expression of the +Human Race. If Man, then, is the highest of created mammals, is not his +natural speech (Slang) the highest of created languages? It is generally +conceded that Literature is the most exalted expression of Language. +Would not the Literature, then, which employs the highest of created +languages (Slang) be the supreme Literature of the world? + +By such logical, irrefutable, inductive steps have I proven not only the +Status of Slang, but the literary importance of these Sonnets which it +is at once my scientific duty and my esthetic pleasure to introduce. + +The twenty-six exquisite Sonnets which form this Cycle were written, +probably, during the years 1906 and 1907. Their author was William Henry +Smith, a car conductor, who penned his passion, from time to time, on +the back of transfer-slips which he treasured carefully in his hat (1). +We have it from no less an authority than Professor Sznuysko that the +Car Conductor usually performed these literary feats in public, writing +between fares on the rear platform of a Sixth Avenue car. Smith's +devotion to his Musa Sanctissima was often so hypnotic, I am told, that +he neglected to let passengers on and off--nay, it is even held by some +critics that he occasionally forgot to collect a fare. But be it said to +his undying honor that his Employers never suffered from such +carelessness, for it was the custom of our Poet to demand double fares +from the old, the feeble and the mentally deficient. + +Even as the illimitable ichor of star-dust, the mysterious Demiurge of +the Universe, keeps the suns and planets to their orbitary revolutions, +so must environment mark the Fas and Nefas of Genius. Plato's Idea of +the Archetypal Man was due, perhaps, as much to the serene weather +conditions of Academe as to the marvelous mentality of Plato. What had +Job eaten for breakfast that he should have given utterance to his +magnificent Lamentation? Was he the discoverer of Human Sorrow or the +pioneer of Human Dyspepsia? + +It is not altogether radical on my part, then, for me to assert that +many of the stylistic peculiarities found in these Sonnets are +attributable to the locale of their inspiration the rear platform of a +Sixth Avenue car. One can plainly hear the jar and jounce of the +elliptical wheels, the cry, "Step lively!" the six o'clock stampede, the +lament of the strap-hanging multitude in such lines as these: + + "Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, + Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. + I rubber vainly at the throng to see + Her golden locks--gee! such a discontent! + Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent--" + +Where are lines like these to be found in the Italian of Petrarch? Where +has Tasso uttered an impassioned confession to resemble this: + + "But when I ogle Pansy in the throng + My heart turns over twice and rings a gong"? + +Of the human or personal record of William Henry Smith very little has +been discovered. Looking over the books of the Metropolitan Street +Railway I unearthed the following entry: + +"Nov. 1, 1907:" + +"W. H. Smith, conductor, discharged." + +"Remarks:--Car No. 21144, William Smith, conductor, ran into large +brewery truck at So. E. cor. Sixth Ave. It is reported that Smith, to +the neglect of his duty, was reading poetry from a book called 'Sonnets +of de Heredia' at the time of the accident. Three Italians were slightly +injured by the accident, and Ethelbert Pangwyn, an actor starring in +'The Girl and the Idiot,' a musical comedy, was killed." + +"Smith was held for manslaughter, but Judge O' Rafferty, who had seen +'The Girl and the Idiot,' discharged the defendant, averring that the +killing of Pangwyn did not constitute a crime." + +What, then, has become of this minstrel who sang the Minnelieder of the +Car-barns? Like Homer, like Omar, like Sappho, like Shakespeare, he is a +Voice singing out of the mists. He was but a Name to his employers; and +his friends, if he has friends, remember him not. These Sonnets, written +neatly on twenty-six violet transfer-slips, were discovered, together +with a rejection blank from a leading magazine, in the Dead Letter +office. According to the current folk-lore in Harlem and the Bronx, +Smith is now living in California employed as a brakeman on the Southern +Pacific Railroad. Some aver that Pansy fell heiress to a sausage +establishment and moved to Italy with her Poet. Still others maintain +that Pansy, Gill the Grip and Maxy the Firebug never existed in real +life--were merely the mind-children of a Symbolist and a dreamer of +dreams. + +To the latter theory I incline at a scholarly angle. This Cycle may be +taken, perhaps, not so much as a living record of human experience as a +lofty parable sounding the key-note of all human life. Gill the Grip is +the Iago, the Mefistofele, the symbolism of a malevolent destiny. Maxy +the Firebug may be the Poet's interpretation of the Social Unrest, of +Doubt, of progressive irresponsibility. Would it be going too far, then, +to say that Pansy stands to us as the symbol of Pan-girlism--as an +almost Anacreontic yearning for the type? Or may not these Sonnets be +taken, in a way, as a modern Vita Nuova wherein a Sixth Avenue Alighieri +calls to his Beatrice and mourns within when, + +"Pansy-girl refuses to occur?" + +So much for the Poet and his Purpose. Should any one of the readers of +this Cycle doubt the enduring greatness of the lines, let him consider +that I, Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger, have seen fit to introduce them +to immortality. + + + (1) Since the salary-books of the Metropolitan Street + Railways show, during the year 1906, 182 conductors named + Smith in their employ, 38 of whom were named William Smith + and 12 William Henry Smith, it is easy for the reader to + conceive my task in establishing the identity of our Poet. + W. C. A. + + + + + +THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR + + + + +PROLOGUE + + + Did some one ask if I am on the job? + I sure am to the pay-roll with my lay, + A hot tabasco-poultice which will stay + Close to the ribs and answer throb-to-throb. + Here have I chewed my Music from the cob + And followed Passion from the get-away + Past the big Grand Stand where the Pousse-Cafe + Christens my Muse as Jennie-on-the-Daub. + + Hark ye, all marks who break the Pure Fool Law, + How I, the Windy Wonder of the Age, + Have fought the Tender Passion to a draw + And got my mug upon the Sporting Page, + Since Love and I collided at the curve + And left me with a Dislocated Nerve. + + + + +I + + + + Am I in bad? upon the tick of nine + Today the Pansy got aboard my ship + And sprung the Trans-Suburban for a trip. + Say, she's the shapely ticket pretty fine! + Next to her pattern Anna Held looks shine + And Lilly Russell doesn't know the grip. + But oh! she's got a deep ingrowing tip + That she must shy at honks like yours and mine. + + I says to her, "Fare, please!" out loud like that, + But she pipes, "Fade, Bill, fade! you pinched my fare." + That get-back tripped your Oswald to the mat, + And yet I yelled, "Cough up here, Golden Hair!" + Eh, what? I got the zing from Pansy's orb + Which says, "Dry out now, Shorty,--please absorb!" + + + + +II + + + + A True McGlook once handed this to me: + When little Bright Eyes cuts the cake for you + Count twenty ere you eat the honey-goo + Which leads to love and matrimony--see? + A small-change bunk what's bats on spending free + Can't four-flush when he's paying rent for two. + The pin to flash on Cupid is 'Skidoo!' + The call for Sweet Sixteen is "23." + + But say! Life looks goshawful on the stretch + Without a Ray of Sunshine in my flat, + With no one there to call me "Handsome wretch," + And dust the fuzz and mildew off my hat. + If she was waiting at the church tonight + You'd find me there with wedding-bells all right! + + + + +III + + + + Pansy got on at Sixteenth Street last night, + And some one flipped a handspring in my heart. + She snickered once, "Oh look, here's Mr. Smart!" + Was I there Henry Miller? guess you're right! + I did the homerun monologue as bright + As any scrub that ever learned the art. + I plum forgot the signals, "Stop" and "Start!" + And almost wrecked the car once--guess I might! + + I took one Mike six blocks beyond the place + He flagged for his. He got as red as ham + And yodelled through his apopleptic face, + "I think you're dips!" I says, "I know I am--" + When Pansy starts to send a wireless wave + She simply just can't make her eyes behave! + + + + +IV + + + + On every car there's always one fat coot + What goes to sleep and dreams he's paid his fare. + And when you squeak he gets the Roosevelt glare, + And hoots, "I won't be dickied with--I'll shoot!" + Then all the passengers get in and root. + Loud cheers of, "Put him off!" and "Make him square!" + Till Mr. Holdfast with an injured air + Pungles his nick and ends the bum dispute. + + It's ever thus on this here rolling ball-- + You've got to pop your coin to ride so far. + The yap that kicks and rings a deadhead call + Must either spend or else get off the car. + On Life's Street Railway wealth may cut the cheese, + But Death rings up and says, "Step lively, please!" + + + + +V + + + + "There'll be some fancy steps at Car-Barn Hall," + Gilly the Gripman pipes me off today, + "This won't be any gabberfest--for say! + Nix but the candy goes to this here ball. + You've got to flash your union card, that's all, + To circulate the maze with Tessie May, + And all the Newport push out Harlem way + Will slip on wax till sunrise,--do you call?" + + I told him that I pulled the gong for that! + If Pansy would be there 'twas was Me for It. + I'd burnish up my buttons, mop my hat, + Polish my pumps and blow in for a hit. + "All to the Fritz," says Gill, "if you get jolly + Around the curves--you're apt to slip your trolley!" + + + + +VI + + + + The lemon-wagon rumbled by today + And dropped me off a sour one--are you on? + I went and gave the boss a cooney con + About the Car-Barn Kick--what did he say? + "Back to your platform, Clarence light and gay, + Jingle the jocund fares, nor think upon + The larks of Harry Lehr or Bath House John, + For they are It and you are still on pay." + + So I have been sky-prancing all night long + A-dragging car-conductors and their queens + Clad in their laughing-robes to join the throng + That makes the Car-Barn function all the beans. + And say! I had a brainstorm just last trip + When I took Pansy's fare from Gill the Grip. + + + + +VII + + + + At Midnight when I got a gasp for lunch + I mushed it for the Car-Barns just to lamp + And see the Creamy Charlies do the vamp + And swing their Fancy Floras in the crunch. + I piped my Pansy in among the bunch + And asked her would she mix it with the Champ, + Wouldn't she like to join me in a stamp? + She saw me first and stopped me with a punch. + + I saw her hook a loop with Gill the Grip, + With Pinky Smith and Handsome Hank she heeled; + With all the dossy bunks she took a skip + Each time the German tune-professor spieled. + But nix with me the lightsome toe she sprung-- + As Caesar said to Cassius, "Ouch! I'm stung!" + + + + +VIII + + + + Forsooth that was a passing lusty clout + That chopped me off with Pansy--don't you fret! + There's quite a blaze inside my garret yet, + And all the Dipper Corps can't put it out. + Gilly the Grip's a pretty ricky tout-- + Under the old rag-rug for him, you bet, + When I put on my Navajo and get + One license to unloose my soul and shout. + + Perhaps he thinks I'm old Molasses Freight + Sidetracked at Pokey Pond and filled with prunes + Waiting for Congress to appropriate + The nuggets draped around me in festoons. + Wait till I ticket Pansy, then I guess + Slow Freight will switch to Honeymoon Express! + + + + +IX + + + + Today I gave a serenade to Gill; + I says, "To put it pleasant you're a screech, + Your smile would shoo the seagulls off the beach, + Your face would give Vesuvius a chill. + You're just what Mr. Shakespeare calls 'a pill + Trying to keep company with a peach.' + Now, if you want to answer with a speech, + Open your trap at once, or else lie still." + + But when I handed Gill the Grip this cluster + He simply clamped his language-mill down tight, + Strangled his guff and acted rather fluster + Although I'm sure I spoke to him polite. + I guess that Mr. Gilly ain't the kind + That understands when people talk refined. + + + + +X + + + + Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, + Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. + I rubber vainly at the throng to see + Her golden locks--gee! such a discontent! + Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent-- + Perhaps she's promised Gill the Grip to be + His No. 1 till Death tolls "23!" + While I am Outsky in the supplement. + + Now and anon some Lizzie flags the train + And I, poor dots, cry, "Rapture, it is her!" + Yet guess again--my hope is all in vain + And Pansy girl refuses to occur. + If this keeps up I think I'll finish swell + Among the jabbers in a padded cell. + + + + +XI + + + + My Trolley hikes to Harlem p.d.q., + And picks up pikers all along the beat. + At six o'clock the aisles are full of feet, + The straps with fingers, and the entire zoo + Boils on the platform with a mad huroo + Reckless as Bronx mosquitoes after meat. + The widow stands, the fat man gets the seat + And Satan smiles like Foxy M. Depew. + + And as we hikes along I thinks, thinks I, + "The human race is like the ocean foam, + Roaring and discontented, peevish, fly--" + Say, why in blazes don't they stay to home? + This travel-sickness is a danger which + Keeps hoboes poor and corporations rich. + + + + +XII + + + + Today I piped my future Ma-in-law. + She got aboard my Pullman and she scared + Three babies into fits the way she glared. + Rattle my baggage if I ever saw + A cracker-box to equal Mother's jaw, + A hardwood-finish face all nailed and squared. + She ossified the gripman when she stared-- + And me? Well, I was overcame with awe. + + But, being Pansy's Ma, 't was up to me + To hand her something pit-a-pat and swell, + And so I says, "Hello, Queen Cherokee! + What ho! for Pansy? hope she's feeling well." + And Ma responds, a trifle tart but game, + "She minds her bizness--hope you feel the same." + + + + +XIII + + + + I don't think Mother chalked me out to win, + To be the steady of her darling child. + She thinks I am a kick-up, something wild, + And no sweet girl should wear my college pin. + She thinks I'm some too piffly with my chin + And my soft prattle simply gets her riled. + I've lost my keys with her, to put it mild, + I don't belong, because I am not In. + + Say how, with such an iceberg on the track, + Can I conduct my car to married bliss? + I hoped that I could whistle Pansy back, + And lo! I got a frostbite off of this! + I'd wrastle Death for Her, I'd fight her Pa,-- + But stab me if I'll syrup to her Ma! + + + + +XIV + + + + E'en as I stood with cobwebs in my tower + A candy vision came and flagged the boat-- + Give forty rah-rah-rahs! O joy, O gloat! + 'Twas Pansy like a fairy in a bower + Warbling, "Hi, stop the car!" With all my power + I yanked the bell. My brain was all afloat, + My heart cut pin-wheels, stole a base at throat, + Sang "Tammany"--and knighthood was in flower. + + I helped her on. My shoes were full of feet. + I says, "How's Ma?" She answers, "Going some." + I doffed my lid and ventured to repeat + The breeze had put the weather on the bum. + Then she replied, not seeming sore or vexed, + "It may not be so punk on Sunday next." + + + + +XV + + + + The Sinful Rich go whizzing by all day + In wealthy wagons, looking pert and swell; + They get the ride, the Commons get the smell + And full of thought and microbes wend their way. + Maxy the Firebug says that Mammon's sway + Is stringing Virtue to a fare-ye-well, + But wait, he says, till Labor with a yell + Soaks Mam a crack forninst the vertebray. + + The Rich, says Max, are simply dips and yeggs + That lift the headlight beads from yaps like us; + They pinch your pie, sew up our ham and eggs + And leave us minus all that they are plus. + The world, says Max, belongs to me and Bill + And Mrs. Casey--whoa! let's roll a pill! + + + + +XVI + + + + At Mrs. Casey's hunger-killing shop + Whither I hie thrice daily for my stew, + I dream I'm Mr. Waldorf as I chew + My prunes or lay my Boston-baked on top. + Growley and sinkers, slum and mutton sop, + India-rubber jelly known as "glue," + A soup-bone goulash with a spud or two, + Clatter below until I signal "Stop!" + + There may be chefs in France or Albany + Can knock a poem from a wedge of pie; + But just give me a check on Mrs. C., + For rapid-filling ballast, murmurs I. + Kings may prefer some tasty wads of hash, + But they don't feed at fifteen cents per crash! + + + + +XVII + + + + Pansy and me for Coney Sunday noon + To see a perfect lady bump the bumps; + We rubbered at the lions with the chumps + And took the Wellman special to the moon. + She asks me, "Dance?" I answers, "Just as soon," + And so we clutched and whirled into the gumps, + But every time I went to stir my stumps + They stuck like gum-drops to a macaroon. + + "I could die dancing, Danny!" murmurs she. + (I gambolled on her corns, she hollered, "Don't!") + "I could die dancing also" (this from me), + "But if you'll pass me up, I guess I won't." + Just then some lemon-sport observed my glide + And warbled, "Slide, you frozen chicken, slide!" + + + + +XVIII + + + + I next sprung Pansy for a four-bit feed-- + It was a giddy tax, but what care I? + We shot the bill-of-fare from soup to pie + And lemonade (that cost an extra seed). + "You're the cute plunge," says Pans', and I agreed + That at a spenderfest I wasn't shy,-- + That when it came to rolling nickels by, + Willie the Cowboy was a perfect bleed. + + She said that Thomas Lawson on a lark + Would faint away to see the way I blew; + She said I'd be the whizz in Central Park, + And Ready Cash to me seemed very few. + I asked her, Did she need a Valentine? + And she responded, "You're the pink for mine!" + + + + +XIX + + + + We took the iron-clad wave-tub home at ten, + And as we sat conversing on the deck + A certain Hester-street spaghetti-neck + Pipes through the darkness, "Who's yer ladyfren'?" + There might have been a hoe-down there and then + (That war-ship never came so near a wreck); + The dog-eye boy got just as pale as heck + And made a duck behind the trenches, when-- + + Pansy boiled up and clamped me by a flip. + "Nixie the kindergarten!" murmurs she. + "Gents," I replied out loud, "Get off the ship + And walk, or else nail down that repartee. + This yard of lace I'm holding, so to speak, + Is pinned on tight--or will be in a week." + + + + +XX + + + + A-lopping on a car-barn bench I spied + Gilly the Grip, quite recent this p.m., + Just like a lily on a broken stem + Or like a Salt Lake buck without a bride. + "Chirk, Gilly, chirk!" I says in tones of pride, + "Perhaps this unhinged heart is just pro tem. + The world is full of pompadours for them + That keep their search-lights peeled from side to side." + + But Gill remarked, "Eh, what? Say, I'm so slow + I couldn't catch the hour-hand on a clock. + I'm simply stationary as they grow;. + A lamp-post race could beat me round the block. + You needn't think you're such an Alfred G., + To motor by a quarry-cart like me!" + + + + +XXI + + + + Next week the wedding-bells won't do a thing, + For I'll be there, I guess, to fill the set, + And Pansy's Ma, she won't be late, you bet, + To see the Reverend Mr. pull the string. + Me for a spike-tailed scabbard and a ring, + A shell-back shirt, forsooth a peacherette. + I'll be the daintiest bridegroom ever yet; + Nothing to do but take the count, then--bing! + + Love in a cottage run on union pay-- + Can Teddy Roosevelt do a sum like that? + Two can eat cheap as one, perhaps, but say, + You've got to beat a quarter pretty flat + To cork three squares, make Little Two Shoes snug + And keep the Wolf from chewing up the rug. + + + + +XXII + + + + Methinks I'm tagged to join the Worry Club, + To chase the fleeting rhino through the gloom, + To bag the boodle, trap the wild mazume + And scratch for corn when Pansy hollers "Grub!" + They say I'll turn as sickly as a chub + When on the First, with dull and deadly boom, + The Rent comes round and walks into the room, + Remarking, "Peel or else file out, you scrub!" + + But when your arms are full of girl and fluff + You hide your nerve behind a yard of grin; + You'd spit into a wild cat's face or bluff + A flock of dragons with a safety pin. + Life's a slow skate, but Love's the dopey gum + That puts a brewery horse in racing trim. + + + + +EPILOGUE + + + + Kind reader, when you 'phone don't ask for me + Enquiring how a Flossie should be won-- + There isn't any Rule Book, are you on? + And Queenie can't be coaxed by recipee. + Some girls like hard-luck music, minor key, + Some like the Gas-car Gussie act, hot ton, + Others are simply fierce for Jolly John + Who loves to make a noise like repartee. + + None but the Nerve, say I, deserves the Fair, + And stony hearts can't stand up long to chin. + If Willie-on-the-doormat lingers there + The chances are he'll be Invited In. + Up against Love the Candy Kid is nix; + The Porous Plaster wins because it sticks + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor, by +Wallace Irwin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE SONNETS *** + +***** This file should be named 5332.txt or 5332.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/3/5332/ + +Produced by David Schwan + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor + +Author: Wallace Irwin + +Release Date: March, 2004 [EBook #5332] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on July 1, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR *** + + + + +This eBook was produced by David Schwan <davidsch@earthlink.net>. + + + +The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor + + + +By +Wallace Irwin + +Author of +The Love Sonnets of a Hoodlum +The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, Junior +Etc. + + + +With a harmless and instructive Introduction +by +Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger + +Professor of Literary Bi-Products +University of Monte Carlo + + + +Muse of my native land, +am I inspir'd? +- Keats. + + + +Paul Elder & Company +San Francisco and New York + + + +Mark what I say! +Attend me where I wheel! +- Troilus and Cressida. + + + +Copyright, 1908 +by Paul Elder and Company + + + +Introduction + + + +Science may conquer the stars, but it does nothing by jumps. As a +Scientist, as well as a philosopher, I am accustomed to reaching the +Transcendental by winding paths. It is characteristic of me that I +should have consented to preface this remarkable Sonnet Cycle only after +supreme deliberation, and that I should at last have determined to speak +in behalf of the Car Conductor for the following reasons: + +1. As a Botanist I am fascinated by the phenomenon of Genius flourishing +from bud to flower, from flower to seed. + +2. As a Psychologist I am anxious to establish once and for all, both by +plano-inductive and precoordinate systems of logic, the Status of Slang. + +What position does Slang occupy in the thought of the world? Let us turn +to Zoology for an answer. + +No traces of Slang may be found among mollusks, crustaceans or the lower +invertebrates. Slang is not common to vertebrate fishes or to whales, +seals, reptiles or anthropoid apes - in a word, slang-speaking is +nowhere prevalent among lower animals. It may, then, be definitely and +clearly asserted that Slang is the natural, logical expression of the +Human Race. If Man, then, is the highest of created mammals, is not his +natural speech (Slang) the highest of created languages? It is generally +conceded that Literature is the most exalted expression of Language. +Would not the Literature, then, which employs the highest of created +languages (Slang) be the supreme Literature of the world? + +By such logical, irrefutable, inductive steps have I proven not only the +Status of Slang, but the literary importance of these Sonnets which it +is at once my scientific duty and my esthetic pleasure to introduce. + +The twenty-six exquisite Sonnets which form this Cycle were written, +probably, during the years 1906 and 1907. Their author was William Henry +Smith, a car conductor, who penned his passion, from time to time, on +the back of transfer-slips which he treasured carefully in his hat[1]. +We have it from no less an authority than Professor Sznuysko that the +Car Conductor usually performed these literary feats in public, writing +between fares on the rear platform of a Sixth Avenue car. Smith's +devotion to his Musa Sanctissima was often so hypnotic, I am told, that +he neglected to let passengers on and off - nay, it is even held by some +critics that he occasionally forgot to collect a fare. But be it said to +his undying honor that his Employers never suffered from such +carelessness, for it was the custom of our Poet to demand double fares +from the old, the feeble and the mentally deficient. + +Even as the illimitable ichor of star-dust, the mysterious Demiurge of +the Universe, keeps the suns and planets to their orbitary revolutions, +so must environment mark the Fas and Nefas of Genius. Plato's Idea of +the Archetypal Man was due, perhaps, as much to the serene weather +conditions of Academe as to the marvelous mentality of Plato. What had +Job eaten for breakfast that he should have given utterance to his +magnificent Lamentation? Was he the discoverer of Human Sorrow or the +pioneer of Human Dyspepsia? + +It is not altogether radical on my part, then, for me to assert that +many of the stylistic peculiarities found in these Sonnets are +attributable to the locale of their inspiration the rear platform of a +Sixth Avenue car. One can plainly hear the jar and jounce of the +elliptical wheels, the cry, "Step lively!" the six o'clock stampede, the +lament of the strap-hanging multitude in such lines as these: + +"Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, +Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. +I rubber vainly at the throng to see +Her golden locks - gee! such a discontent! +Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent - " + +Where are lines like these to be found in the Italian of Petrarch? Where +has Tasso uttered an impassioned confession to resemble this: + +"But when I ogle Pansy in the throng +My heart turns over twice and rings a gong"? + +Of the human or personal record of William Henry Smith very little has +been discovered. Looking over the books of the Metropolitan Street +Railway I unearthed the following entry: + +"Nov. 1, 1907:" + +"W. H. Smith, conductor, discharged." + +"Remarks: - Car No. 21144, William Smith, conductor, ran into large +brewery truck at So. E. cor. Sixth Ave. It is reported that Smith, to +the neglect of his duty, was reading poetry from a book called 'Sonnets +of de Heredia' at the time of the accident. Three Italians were slightly +injured by the accident, and Ethelbert Pangwyn, an actor starring in +'The Girl and the Idiot,' a musical comedy, was killed." + +"Smith was held for manslaughter, but Judge O' Rafferty, who had seen +'The Girl and the Idiot,' discharged the defendant, averring that the +killing of Pangwyn did not constitute a crime." + +What, then, has become of this minstrel who sang the Minnelieder of the +Car-barns? Like Homer, like Omar, like Sappho, like Shakespeare, he is a +Voice singing out of the mists. He was but a Name to his employers; and +his friends, if he has friends, remember him not. These Sonnets, written +neatly on twenty-six violet transfer-slips, were discovered, together +with a rejection blank from a leading magazine, in the Dead Letter +office. According to the current folk-lore in Harlem and the Bronx, +Smith is now living in California employed as a brakeman on the Southern +Pacific Railroad. Some aver that Pansy fell heiress to a sausage +establishment and moved to Italy with her Poet. Still others maintain +that Pansy, Gill the Grip and Maxy the Firebug never existed in real +life - were merely the mind-children of a Symbolist and a dreamer of +dreams. + +To the latter theory I incline at a scholarly angle. This Cycle may be +taken, perhaps, not so much as a living record of human experience as a +lofty parable sounding the key-note of all human life. Gill the Grip is +the Iago, the Mefistofele, the symbolism of a malevolent destiny. Maxy +the Firebug may be the Poet's interpretation of the Social Unrest, of +Doubt, of progressive irresponsibility. Would it be going too far, then, +to say that Pansy stands to us as the symbol of Pan-girlism - as an +almost Anacreontic yearning for the type? Or may not these Sonnets be +taken, in a way, as a modern Vita Nuova wherein a Sixth Avenue Alighieri +calls to his Beatrice and mourns within when, + +"Pansy-girl refuses to occur?" + +So much for the Poet and his Purpose. Should any one of the readers of +this Cycle doubt the enduring greatness of the lines, let him consider +that I, Wolfgang Copernicus Addleburger, have seen fit to introduce them +to immortality. + + + +[1] Since the salary-books of the Metropolitan Street Railways show, +during the year 1906, 182 conductors named Smith in their employ, 38 of +whom were named William Smith and 12 William Henry Smith, it is easy for +the reader to conceive my task in establishing the identity of our Poet. +W. C. A. + + + +The Love Sonnets of a Car Conductor + + + +Prologue + + + +Did some one ask if I am on the job? +I sure am to the pay-roll with my lay, +A hot tabasco-poultice which will stay +Close to the ribs and answer throb-to-throb. +Here have I chewed my Music from the cob +And followed Passion from the get-away +Past the big Grand Stand where the Pousse-Café +Christens my Muse as Jennie-on-the-Daub. + +Hark ye, all marks who break the Pure Fool Law, +How I, the Windy Wonder of the Age, +Have fought the Tender Passion to a draw +And got my mug upon the Sporting Page, +Since Love and I collided at the curve +And left me with a Dislocated Nerve. + + + +I + + + +Am I in bad? upon the tick of nine +Today the Pansy got aboard my ship +And sprung the Trans-Suburban for a trip. +Say, she's the shapely ticket pretty fine! +Next to her pattern Anna Held looks shine +And Lilly Russell doesn't know the grip. +But oh! she's got a deep ingrowing tip +That she must shy at honks like yours and mine. + +I says to her, "Fare, please!" out loud like that, +But she pipes, "Fade, Bill, fade! you pinched my fare." +That get-back tripped your Oswald to the mat, +And yet I yelled, "Cough up here, Golden Hair!" +Eh, what? I got the zing from Pansy's orb +Which says, "Dry out now, Shorty, - please absorb!" + + + +II + + + +A True McGlook once handed this to me: +When little Bright Eyes cuts the cake for you +Count twenty ere you eat the honey-goo +Which leads to love and matrimony - see? +A small-change bunk what's bats on spending free +Can't four-flush when he's paying rent for two. +The pin to flash on Cupid is 'Skidoo!' +The call for Sweet Sixteen is 23." + +But say! Life looks goshawful on the stretch +Without a Ray of Sunshine in my flat, +With no one there to call me "Handsome wretch," +And dust the fuzz and mildew off my hat. +If she was waiting at the church tonight +You'd find me there with wedding-bells all right! + + + +III + + + +Pansy got on at Sixteenth Street last night, +And some one flipped a handspring in my heart. +She snickered once, "Oh look, here's Mr. Smart!" +Was I there Henry Miller? guess you're right! +I did the homerun monologue as bright +As any scrub that ever learned the art. +I plum forgot the signals, "Stop" and "Start!" +And almost wrecked the car once - guess I might! + +I took one Mike six blocks beyond the place +He flagged for his. He got as red as ham +And yodelled through his apopleptic face, +"I think you're dips!" I says, "I know I am - " +When Pansy starts to send a wireless wave +She simply just can't make her eyes behave! + + + +IV + + + +On every car there's always one fat coot +What goes to sleep and dreams he's paid his fare. +And when you squeak he gets the Roosevelt glare, +And hoots, "I won't be dickied with - I'll shoot!" +Then all the passengers get in and root. +Loud cheers of, "Put him off!" and "Make him square!" +Till Mr. Holdfast with an injured air +Pungles his nick and ends the bum dispute. + +It's ever thus on this here rolling ball - +You've got to pop your coin to ride so far. +The yap that kicks and rings a deadhead call +Must either spend or else get off the car. +On Life's Street Railway wealth may cut the cheese, +But Death rings up and says, "Step lively, please!" + + + +V + + + +"There'll be some fancy steps at Car-Barn Hall," +Gilly the Gripman pipes me off today, +"This won't be any gabberfest - for say! +Nix but the candy goes to this here ball. +You've got to flash your union card, that's all, +To circulate the maze with Tessie May, +And all the Newport push out Harlem way +Will slip on wax till sunrise, - do you call?" + +I told him that I pulled the gong for that! +If Pansy would be there 'twas was Me for It. +I'd burnish up my buttons, mop my hat, +Polish my pumps and blow in for a hit. +"All to the Fritz," says Gill, "if you get jolly +Around the curves - you're apt to slip your trolley!" + + + +VI + + + +The lemon-wagon rumbled by today +And dropped me off a sour one - are you on? +I went and gave the boss a cooney con +About the Car-Barn Kick - what did he say? +"Back to your platform, Clarence light and gay, +Jingle the jocund fares, nor think upon +The larks of Harry Lehr or Bath House John, +For they are It and you are still on pay." + +So I have been sky-prancing all night long +A-dragging car-conductors and their queens +Clad in their laughing-robes to join the throng +That makes the Car-Barn function all the beans. +And say! I had a brainstorm just last trip +When I took Pansy's fare from Gill the Grip. + + + +VII + + + +At Midnight when I got a gasp for lunch +I mushed it for the Car-Barns just to lamp +And see the Creamy Charlies do the vamp +And swing their Fancy Floras in the crunch. +I piped my Pansy in among the bunch +And asked her would she mix it with the Champ, +Wouldn't she like to join me in a stamp? +She saw me first and stopped me with a punch. + +I saw her hook a loop with Gill the Grip, +With Pinky Smith and Handsome Hank she heeled; +With all the dossy bunks she took a skip +Each time the German tune-professor spieled. +But nix with me the lightsome toe she sprung - +As Caesar said to Cassius, "Ouch! I'm stung!" + + + +VIII + + + +Forsooth that was a passing lusty clout +That chopped me off with Pansy - don't you fret! +There's quite a blaze inside my garret yet, +And all the Dipper Corps can't put it out. +Gilly the Grip's a pretty ricky tout - +Under the old rag-rug for him, you bet, +When I put on my Navajo and get +One license to unloose my soul and shout. + +Perhaps he thinks I'm old Molasses Freight +Sidetracked at Pokey Pond and filled with prunes +Waiting for Congress to appropriate +The nuggets draped around me in festoons. +Wait till I ticket Pansy, then I guess +Slow Freight will switch to Honeymoon Express! + + + +IX + + + +Today I gave a serenade to Gill; +I says, "To put it pleasant you're a screech, +Your smile would shoo the seagulls off the beach, +Your face would give Vesuvius a chill. +You're just what Mr. Shakespeare calls 'a pill +Trying to keep company with a peach.' +Now, if you want to answer with a speech, +Open your trap at once, or else lie still." + +But when I handed Gill the Grip this cluster +He simply clamped his language-mill down tight, +Strangled his guff and acted rather fluster +Although I'm sure I spoke to him polite. +I guess that Mr. Gilly ain't the kind +That understands when people talk refined. + + + +X + + + +Three days with sad skidoo have came and went, +Yet Pansy cometh nix to ride with me. +I rubber vainly at the throng to see +Her golden locks - gee! such a discontent! +Perhaps she's beat it with some soapy gent - +Perhaps she's promised Gill the Grip to be +His No. 1 till Death tolls "23!" +While I am Outsky in the supplement. + +Now and anon some Lizzie flags the train +And I, poor dots, cry, "Rapture, it is her!" +Yet guess again - my hope is all in vain +And Pansy girl refuses to occur. +If this keeps up I think I'll finish swell +Among the jabbers in a padded cell. + + + +XI + + + +My Trolley hikes to Harlem p.d.q., +And picks up pikers all along the beat. +At six o'clock the aisles are full of feet, +The straps with fingers, and the entire zoo +Boils on the platform with a mad huroo +Reckless as Bronx mosquitoes after meat. +The widow stands, the fat man gets the seat +And Satan smiles like Foxy M. Depew. + +And as we hikes along I thinks, thinks I, +"The human race is like the ocean foam, +Roaring and discontented, peevish, fly - " +Say, why in blazes don't they stay to home? +This travel-sickness is a danger which +Keeps hoboes poor and corporations rich. + + + +XII + + + +Today I piped my future Ma-in-law. +She got aboard my Pullman and she scared +Three babies into fits the way she glared. +Rattle my baggage if I ever saw +A cracker-box to equal Mother's jaw, +A hardwood-finish face all nailed and squared. +She ossified the gripman when she stared - +And me? Well, I was overcame with awe. + +But, being Pansy's Ma, 't was up to me +To hand her something pit-a-pat and swell, +And so I says, "Hello, Queen Cherokee! +What ho! for Pansy? hope she's feeling well." +And Ma responds, a trifle tart but game, +"She minds her bizness - hope you feel the same." + + + +XIII + + + +I don't think Mother chalked me out to win, +To be the steady of her darling child. +She thinks I am a kick-up, something wild, +And no sweet girl should wear my college pin. +She thinks I'm some too piffly with my chin +And my soft prattle simply gets her riled. +I've lost my keys with her, to put it mild, +I don't belong, because I am not In. + +Say how, with such an iceberg on the track, +Can I conduct my car to married bliss? +I hoped that I could whistle Pansy back, +And lo! I got a frostbite off of this! +I'd wrastle Death for Her, I'd fight her Pa, - +But stab me if I'll syrup to her Ma! + + + +XIV + + + +E'en as I stood with cobwebs in my tower +A candy vision came and flagged the boat - +Give forty rah-rah-rahs! O joy, O gloat! +'Twas Pansy like a fairy in a bower +Warbling, "Hi, stop the car!" With all my power +I yanked the bell. My brain was all afloat, +My heart cut pin-wheels, stole a base at throat, +Sang "Tammany" - and knighthood was in flower. + +I helped her on. My shoes were full of feet. +I says, "How's Ma?" She answers, "Going some." +I doffed my lid and ventured to repeat +The breeze had put the weather on the bum. +Then she replied, not seeming sore or vexed, +"It may not be so punk on Sunday next." + + + +XV + + + +The Sinful Rich go whizzing by all day +In wealthy wagons, looking pert and swell; +They get the ride, the Commons get the smell +And full of thought and microbes wend their way. +Maxy the Firebug says that Mammon's sway +Is stringing Virtue to a fare-ye-well, +But wait, he says, till Labor with a yell +Soaks Mam a crack forninst the vertebray. + +The Rich, says Max, are simply dips and yeggs +That lift the headlight beads from yaps like us; +They pinch your pie, sew up our ham and eggs +And leave us minus all that they are plus. +The world, says Max, belongs to me and Bill +And Mrs. Casey - whoa! let's roll a pill! + + + +XVI + + + +At Mrs. Casey's hunger-killing shop +Whither I hie thrice daily for my stew, +I dream I'm Mr. Waldorf as I chew +My prunes or lay my Boston-baked on top. +Growley and sinkers, slum and mutton sop, +India-rubber jelly known as "glue," +A soup-bone goulash with a spud or two, +Clatter below until I signal "Stop!" + +There may be chefs in France or Albany +Can knock a poem from a wedge of pie; +But just give me a check on Mrs. C., +For rapid-filling ballast, murmurs I. +Kings may prefer some tasty wads of hash, +But they don't feed at fifteen cents per crash! + + + +XVII + + + +Pansy and me for Coney Sunday noon +To see a perfect lady bump the bumps; +We rubbered at the lions with the chumps +And took the Wellman special to the moon. +She asks me, "Dance?" I answers, "Just as soon," +And so we clutched and whirled into the gumps, +But every time I went to stir my stumps +They stuck like gum-drops to a macaroon. + +"I could die dancing, Danny!" murmurs she. +(I gambolled on her corns, she hollered, "Don't!") +"I could die dancing also" (this from me)," +"But if you'll pass me up, I guess I won't." +Just then some lemon-sport observed my glide +And warbled, "Slide, you frozen chicken, slide!" + + + +XVIII + + + +I next sprung Pansy for a four-bit feed - +It was a giddy tax, but what care I? +We shot the bill-of-fare from soup to pie +And lemonade (that cost an extra seed). +"You're the cute plunge," says Pans', and I agreed +That at a spenderfest I wasn't shy, - +That when it came to rolling nickels by, +Willie the Cowboy was a perfect bleed. + +She said that Thomas Lawson on a lark +Would faint away to see the way I blew; +She said I'd be the whizz in Central Park, +And Ready Cash to me seemed very few. +I asked her, Did she need a Valentine? +And she responded, "You're the pink for mine!" + + + +XIX + + + +We took the iron-clad wave-tub home at ten, +And as we sat conversing on the deck +A certain Hester-street spaghetti-neck +Pipes through the darkness, "Who's yer ladyfren'?" +There might have been a hoe-down there and then +(That war-ship never came so near a wreck); +The dog-eye boy got just as pale as heck +And made a duck behind the trenches, when - + +Pansy boiled up and clamped me by a flip. +"Nixie the kindergarten!" murmurs she. +"Gents," I replied out loud, "Get off the ship +And walk, or else nail down that repartee. +This yard of lace I'm holding, so to speak, +Is pinned on tight - or will be in a week." + + + +XX + + + +A-lopping on a car-barn bench I spied +Gilly the Grip, quite recent this g. m., +Just like a lily on a broken stem +Or like a Salt Lake buck without a bride. +"Chirk, Gilly, chirk!" I says in tones of pride, +"Perhaps this unhinged heart is just pro tem. +The world is full of pompadours for them +That keep their search-lights peeled from side to side." + +But Gill remarked, "Eh, what? Say, I'm so slow +I couldn't catch the hour-hand on a clock. +I'm simply stationary as they grow;. +A lamp-post race could beat me round the block. +You needn't think you're such an Alfred G., +To motor by a quarry-cart like me!" + + + +XXI + + + +Next week the wedding-bells won't do a thing, +For I'll be there, I guess, to fill the set, +And Pansy's Ma, she won't be late, you bet, +To see the Reverend Mr. pull the string. +Me for a spike-tailed scabbard and a ring, +A shell-back shirt, forsooth a peacherette. +I'll be the daintiest bridegroom ever yet; +Nothing to do but take the count, then - bing! + +Love in a cottage run on union pay - +Can Teddy Roosevelt do a sum like that? +Two can eat cheap as one, perhaps, but say, +You've got to beat a quarter pretty flat +To cork three squares, make Little Two Shoes snug +And keep the Wolf from chewing up the rug. + + + +XXII + + + +Methinks I'm tagged to join the Worry Club, +To chase the fleeting rhino through the gloom, +To bag the boodle, trap the wild mazume +And scratch for corn when Pansy hollers "Grub!" +They say I'll turn as sickly as a chub +When on the First, with dull and deadly boom, +The Rent comes round and walks into the room, +Remarking, "Peel or else file out, you scrub!" + +But when your arms are full of girl and fluff +You hide your nerve behind a yard of grin; +You'd spit into a wild cat's face or bluff +A flock of dragons with a safety pin. +Life's a slow skate, but Love's the dopey gum +That puts a brewery horse in racing trim. + + + +Epilogue + + + +Kind reader, when you 'phone don't ask for me +Enquiring how a Flossie should be won - +There isn't any Rule Book, are you on? +And Queenie can't be coaxed by recipee. +Some girls like hard-luck music, minor key, +Some like the Gas-car Gussie act, hot ton, +Others are simply fierce for Jolly John +Who loves to make a noise like repartee. + +None but the Nerve, say I, deserves the Fair, +And stony hearts can't stand up long to chin. +If Willie-on-the-doormat lingers there +The chances are he'll be Invited In. +Up against Love the Candy Kid is nix; +The Porous Plaster wins because it sticks + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE LOVE SONNETS OF A CAR CONDUCTOR *** + +This file should be named tlscc10.txt or tlscc10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, tlscc11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, tlscc10a.txt + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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