Olives

    OLIVES (1915)
   
    Orrick Johns

    1. Fingers

    I've ten fingers
    Very much admired,
    I shall frame them
    For they cannot do anything;
    They cannot earn dinner
    Or even hold a pebble...
    Pebbles are pretty falling through them.

    2. Shoestring

    Little old shoe,
    You need a shoe-string;
    I shall find one for you,
    For without it you are helpless
    As a man who studies regulations,
    But with a yellow one
    Like a woman who is bald.

    3. Beautiful Mind

    Oh, beautiful mind,
    I lost it
    In a lot of frying pans
    And calendars and carpets
    And beer bottles....
    Oh, my beautiful mind!

    4. Miggles

    Miggles--
    That was his name,
    Everyone always said,
    "Miggles did it."
    Oh, Miggles,
    I admired you from the beginning,
    Miggles!

    5. A Room

    It is a room that sets people thinking,
    So they say,
    Lighted like grandma's moonflowers....
    Swish--I hear something in the corner,
    Suddenly,
    And I wish I were a cat.

    6. Blue Undershirts

    Blue Undershirts,
    Upon a line,
    It is not necessary to say to you
    Anything about it--
    What they do,
    What they might do ... blue undershirts.

    7. In Bed

    I am tortured
    By this borrowed mattress...
    How do you lie,
    Napoleon?

    8. In the Square

    They made a statue
    Of a general on horseback,
    With his face turned nobly
    Toward the crupper...
    'Twas true
    Of him
    Quite half the time.

    9. At the Door

    I have only a tingling remembrance
    Not of his eyes
    But of
    A dandelion...
    Nevertheless,
    The whole of him,
    The whole of me,
    There--
    Known, elicited, understood.

    10. On the Table

    Little duck
    Made of plaster,
    With your head
    Upon a spring,
    When my hand trembles upon the table
    You nod,
    And when I chuckle too...
    Such understanding,
    C'est henaurme!

    11. In the Street

    Dinky, slinky,
    You must not wink
    That way...
    You hussy,
    Do you forget I think
    For both of us?

    12. In the Orchard

    This morning,
    As the quince blossoms died,
    The cherries were ripening...
    Such are all your moments,
    Little one.

    13. Somewhere

    Now I know
    I have been eating apple-pie for breakfast
    In the New England
    Of your sexuality.

    14. A Moon

    It lasted a month,
    We had one moon...
    You took it for a baby
    And when it cried
    For a bib and a bottle,
    All was over.