Home Again With Me

 
I broke down, and simply jes
Bellered like a boy – I guess! —
 
 
Women claimed I did, but I
Alius helt I didn't cry
But wuz laughin', – and I wuz, —
(Men don't cry like women does!)
Well, right then and there I felt
'T 'uz her mother's doin's, and,
Jes like to myse'f, I knelt,
Whisperin' "I understand."…
 
 
So I've raised her, you might say,
Stric'ly in the narrer way
'At her mother walked therein —
Not so quite religiously,
Yit still strivin'-like to do
Ever'thing a father could
Do he knowed the mother would
Ef she'd lived. – And now all's through
And I' got her home ag'in —
Home ag'in with me!
 
 
And I' bin so lonesome, too —
Here o' late, especially, —
"Old Aunt Abigail," you know,
Ain't no company; – and so
Jes the hired hand, you see —
Jonas – like a relative
More – sence he come here to live
With us, nigh ten year' ago.
 
 
Still he don't count much, you know.
In the line o' company —
Lonesome, 'peared-like, 'most as me!
So, as I say, I' bin so
Special lonesome-like and blue,
With Elviry, like she's bin,
'Way so much, last two er three
Year'. – But now she's home ag'in —
Home ag'in with me!
 
 
Drivin' fe'r her yisterday,
Me and Jonas – gay and spry, —
We jes cut up, all the way! —
Yes, and sung! – tel, blame it! I
Keyed my voice up 'bout as high
As when – days 'at I wuz young —
"Buckwheat-notes" wuz all they sung