<h2>LOVE SONNETS OF AN OFFICE BOY</h2>
<h3>BY S.E. KISER</h3>
<h3>I</h3>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">Oh, if you only knowed how much I like<br/></span>
<span class="i2">To stand here, when the "old man" ain't around,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And watch your soft, white fingers while you pound<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Away at them there keys! Each time you strike<br/></span>
<span class="i2">It almost seems to me as though you'd found<br/></span>
<span class="i0">So me way, while writin' letters, how to play<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Sweet music on that thing, because the sound<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Is something I could listen to all day.<br/></span></div>
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">You're twenty-five or six, and I'm fourteen,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And you don't hardly ever notice me—<br/></span>
<span class="i2">But when you do, you call me Willie! Gee,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">I wisht I'd bundles of the old long green<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And could be twenty-eight or nine or so,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And something happened to your other beau.<br/></span></div>
</div>
<h3>VI</h3>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">When you're typewritin' and that long-legged clerk<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Tips back there on his chair and smiles at you,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And you look up and get to smilin', too,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">I'd like to go and give his chair a jerk<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And send him flyin' till his head went through<br/></span>
<span class="i0">The door that goes out to the hall, and when<br/></span>
<span class="i2">They picked him up he'd be all black and blue<br/></span>
<span class="i0">And you'd be nearly busted laughin' then.</span><span class='pagenum'><SPAN name="Page_1057" id="Page_1057"></SPAN></span><br/></div>
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">But if I done it, maybe you would run<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And hold his head and smooth his hair and say<br/></span>
<span class="i2">It made you sad that he got dumped that way,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">And I'd get h'isted out for what I done—<br/></span>
<span class="i2">I wish that he'd get fired and you'd stay<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And suddenly I'd be a man some day.<br/></span></div>
</div>
<h3>VIII</h3>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">This morning when that homely, long-legged clerk<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Come in he had a rose he got somewhere;<br/></span>
<span class="i2">He went and kind of leaned against her chair,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Instead of goin' on about his work,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">And stood around and talked to her a while,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Because the boss was out,—and both took care<br/></span>
<span class="i2">To watch the door; and when he left her there<br/></span>
<span class="i0">He dropped the flower with a sickish smile.<br/></span></div>
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">I snuck it from the glass of water she<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Had stuck it in, and tore it up and put<br/></span>
<span class="i2">It on the floor and smashed it with my foot,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">When neither him nor her was watchin' me—<br/></span>
<span class="i2">I'd like to rub the stem acrost his nose,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And I wish they'd never be another rose.<br/></span></div>
</div>
<h3>XIII</h3>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">Last night I dreamed about her in my sleep;<br/></span>
<span class="i2">I thought that her and me had went away<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Out on some hill where birds sung 'round all day,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">And I had got a job of herdin' sheep.<br/></span>
<span class="i0">I thought that she had went along to keep<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Me comp'ny, and we'd set around for hours<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Just lovin', and I'd go and gather flowers<br/></span>
<span class="i0">And pile them at her feet, all in a heap.</span><span class='pagenum'><SPAN name="Page_1058" id="Page_1058"></SPAN></span><br/></div>
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">It seemed to me like heaven, bein' there<br/></span>
<span class="i2">With only her besides the sheep and birds,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And us not sayin' anything but words<br/></span>
<span class="i0">About the way we loved. I wouldn't care<br/></span>
<span class="i2">To ever wake again if I could still<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Dream we was there forever on the hill.<br/></span></div>
</div>
<h3>XXVII</h3>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">It's over now; the blow has fell at last;<br/></span>
<span class="i2">It seems as though the sun can't shine no more,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And nothing looks the way it did before;<br/></span>
<span class="i0">The glad thoughts that I used to think are past.<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Her desk's shut up to-day, the lid's locked fast;<br/></span>
<span class="i2">The keys where she typewrote are still; her chair<br/></span>
<span class="i2">Looks sad and lonesome standin' empty there—<br/></span>
<span class="i0">I'd like to let the tears come if I dast.<br/></span></div>
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">This morning when the boss come in he found<br/></span>
<span class="i2">A letter that he'd got from her, and so<br/></span>
<span class="i0">He read it over twice and turned around<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And said: "The little fool's got married!" Oh,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">It seemed as if I'd sink down through the ground,<br/></span>
<span class="i2">And never peep no more—I didn't, though.<br/></span>
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN name="Page_1059" id="Page_1059"></SPAN></span></div>
</div>
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