LIFE is fading fast away, silver threads are on my brow; will you love
me when I’m gray, as you love me now, my frau? Will you love me when I’m
old, and my temper’s on the blink, and I sit around and scold till I
drive the folks to drink? When I have the rheumatiz, and lumbago, and
repeat, and the cusswords fairly sizz as I nurse my swollen feet; when a
crutch I have to use, since my trilbys are so lame that they will not
fit my shoes, will you love me just the same? When the gout infests my
toes, and all vanished are my charms, will you kiss me on the nose, will
you clasp me in your arms? Silver threads are in the gold, life will
soon have run its lease; I’d be glad if I were told that your love will
still increase when my high ambition fails, and my hopes are all
unstrung, and I tell my tiresome tales of the days when I was young;
when I sit around the shack making loud and dismal moan, of the stitches
in my back, and my aching collar bone; when the asthma racks my chest so
I cannot speak a word, will you fold me to your breast, saying I’m your
honeybird? When I’m palsied, stiff and sere, when I’m weary of the game,
tell me, O Jemima dear, will you love me just the same?
[Illustration]
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