Edgar Albert Guest Poems

God made the little boys for fun, for rough and tumble times of play;
He made their little legs to run and race and scamper through the day.
He made them strong for climbing trees, he suited them for horns and
drums,
...

The doctor leads a busy life, he wages war with death;
Long hours he spends to help the one who's fighting hard for breath;
He cannot call his time his own, nor share in others' fun,
His duties claim him through the night when others' work is done.
...

You have given me riches and ease,
You have given me joys through the years,
I have sat in the shade of your trees,
With the song of your birds in my ears.
...

Oh, we have friends in England, and we have friends in France,
And should we have to travel there through some strange circumstance,
Undaunted we should sail away, and gladly should we go,
Because awaiting us would be somebody that we know.
...

I might wish the world were better,
I might sit around and sigh
For a water that is wetter
And a bluer sort of sky.
...

When I was a boy, and it chanced to rain,
Mother would always watch for me;
She used to stand by the window pane,
...

The saddest sort of death to die
Would be to quit the game called life
And know, beneath the gentle sky,
You'd lived a slacker in the strife.
...

Pa's not so very big or brave; he can't lift weights like Uncle Jim;
His hands are soft like little girls'; most anyone could wallop him.
Ma weighs a whole lot more than Pa. When they go swimming, she could stay
...

You don't begrudge the labor when the roses start to bloom;
You don't recall the dreary days that won you their perfume;
You don't recall a single care
...

When I was young and frivolous and never stopped to think,
When I was always doing wrong, or just upon the brink;
When I was just a lad of seven and eight and nine and ten,
...