And this was your cradle?
Why, surely, my Jenny,
Such slender dimensions
Go somewhat to show
You were a delightfully
Small picaninny
Some nineteen or twenty
Short summers ago.
Your baby-day flowed
In a much troubled channel;
I see you as then
In your impotent strife,
A tight little bundle
Of wailing and flannel,
Perplexed with that
Newly-found fardel called Life,
To hint at an infantine
Frailty is scandal;
Let bygones be bygones--
And somebody knows
It was bliss such a baby
To dance and to dandle,
Your cheeks were so velvet,
So rosy your toes.
Ay, here is your cradle,
And Hope, a bright spirit,
With love now is watching
Beside it, I know.
They guard the small nest
You yourself did inherit
Some nineteen or twenty
Short summers ago.
It is Hope gilds the future--
Love welcomes it smiling;
Thus wags this old world,
Therefore stay not to ask,
"My future bids fair,
Is my future beguiling?"
If masked, still it pleases--
Then raise not the mask.
Is life a poor coil
Some would gladly be doffing?
He is riding post-haste
Who their wrongs will adjust;
For at most 'tis a footstep
From cradle to coffin--
From a spoonful of pap
To a mouthful of dust.
Then smile as your future
Is smiling, my Jenny!
Tho' blossoms of promise
Are lost in the rose,
I still see the face
Of my small picaninny
Unchang'd, for these cheeks
Are as blooming as those.
Ay, here is your cradle!
Much, much to my liking,
Though nineteen or twenty
Long winters have sped;
But, hark! as I'm talking
There's six o'clock striking,
It is time Jennie's baby
Should be in its bed.