PRIVATE THEATRICALS

A quite convincing axiom

Is, "Life is like a play";

For, turning back its pages some

Few dog-eared years away,

I find where I

Committed my

Love-tale--with brackets where to sigh.

I feel an idle interest

To read again the page;

I enter, as a lover dressed,

At twenty years of age,

And play the part

With throbbing heart,

And all an actor's glowing art.

And she who plays my Lady-love

Excels!--Her loving glance

Has power her audience to move--

I am her audience.--

Her acting tact,

To tell the fact,

"Brings down the house" in every act.

And often we defy the curse

Of storms and thunder-showers,

To meet together and rehearse

This little play of ours--

I think, when she

"Makes love" to me,

She kisses very naturally!

. . . . . .

Yes; it's convincing--rather--

That "Life is like a play":

I am playing "Heavy Father"

In a "Screaming Farce" to-day,

That so "brings down

The house," I frown,

And fain would "ring the curtain down."

The Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley — Volume 1 · 第 22 / 111 题