Out to Old Aunt Mary's

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

by James Whitcomb Riley 

( I can just hear Dad quoting this while standing in the kitchen!)

Wasn't it pleasant, O brother mine,
In those old days of the lost sunshine
Of youth—when the Saturday's chores were through,
And the "Sunday's wood" in the kitchen, too,
And we went visiting, "me and you," Out to Old Aunt Mary's?—

"Me and you"—and the morning fair,
With the dewdrops twinkling everywhere;
The scent of the cherry-blossoms blown
After us, in the roadway lone,
Our capering shadows onward thrown— Out to Old Aunt Mary's.

It all comes back so clear to-day!
Though I am as bald as you are gray,—
Out by the barn-lot and down the lane,
We patter along in the dust again,
As light as the tips of the drops of rain,
Out to Old Aunt Mary's

Why, I see her now in the open door
Where the little gourds grew up the sides and o'er The clapboard roof!—
And her face—ah, me! Wasn't it good for a boy to see—
And wasn't it good for a boy to be Out to Old Aunt Mary's?—

For, O my brother so far away, This is to tell you—she waits to-day
To welcome us:—Aunt Mary fell Asleep this morning, whispering,
"Tell The boys to come."...And all is well Out to Old Aunt Mary's.