RUBAIYAT OF A COW COCKIE

Northern Advocate, 29 February 1932, Page 7

RUBAIYAT OF A COW COCKIE

■ Wake! for the sun, though still far out i of sight, I Heralds the mom —and though as yet ’tis night, ■ We'must arise and don our sticky togs, ■ Yarding the cows by Saturn’s glim- , mcring light. Dreaming when Dawn’s left hand was in the sky,. I heard a voice within the cowshed cry: 1 “Come on, you blighters, get a wriggle on; It matters nothing -when you work nor why.” There, with a benzine tin beneath tlie cow, A pot of grease, a three-legged stool and thou •Wer’t not for auctioneer and mortgagee, I’d chuck the sordid business here and now. I sometimes think that never seems so blue The Cookie’s outlook, as when I and I you I Crouch ’ncath the cows on some cold | rainy morn | Eealise that all our profits go—whom I to? r r That earthly hope men sot their hearts upon, Two bob a pound to start with and anon A bonus that shall make it two-and-nine, Is “kidstakes” and it simply can't • be done. Of chairman and directors who discussed - Of over-run so wisely, they are thrust Like foolish prophets forth, their words to scorn Are scattered, ami the company’s gone bust. j Oh, those who didst with mortgage and with bill Invest the soil that I’m supposed to till, Thou with us with foreclosure round enmesh, Grab all thou canst and put me through the mill. All, my beloved, fill the form that clears Today of all back debts and future scares; Tomorrow, ,why, tomorrow I may be Bankrupt and swanking with the profiteers. And that inverted dray, which is the sty, Whereunder crawling coop the pigs do lie, Look not to them for help nor aid, for they Will fetch just nothing when the cows are dry. Of mangolds and the various kinds of swedes, One plants to satisfy the bovine needs, Myself, in a l l I ever tried to grow, Was never rich in anything but weeds. The dock, the vine (blackberry) and ox-eye, Eagwort, Canadian Thistle, tell me why They grow so fast, despite of all my toil ? I grub them, but they never seem to die. Strange is it not that of the myriads who ‘ Before us used this self-same work to do Not one returns to show us we are chumps. We to discover that, must do it, too. And, when thyself, with muddy feet shall pass Among the- cows star-scattered on the grass, And on thy mournful errand reach the spot That once knew me, then write me down an ass.