John Smith
To-day I strayed in Charing Cross as wretched as could be
With thinking of my home and friends across the tumbling sea;
There was no water in my eyes, but my spirits were depressed
And my heart lay like a sodden, soggy doughnut in my breast.
This way and that streamed multitudes, that gayly passed me by--
Not one in all the crowd knew me and not a one knew I!
'Oh, for a touch of home!' I sighed; 'oh, for a friendly face!
Oh, for a hearty handclasp in this teeming desert place!'
And so, soliloquizing as a homesick creature will,
Incontinent, I wandered down the noisy, bustling hill
And drifted, automatic-like and vaguely, into Lowe's,
Where Fortune had in store a panacea for my woes.
The register was open, and there dawned upon my sight
A name that filled and thrilled me with a cyclone of delight--
The name that I shall venerate unto my dying day--
The proud, immortal signature: 'John Smith, U.S.A.'
Wildly I clutched the register and brooded on that name--
I knew John Smith, yet could not well identify the same.
I knew him North, I knew him South, I knew him East and West--
I knew him all so well I knew not which I knew the best.
His eyes, I recollect, were gray, and black, and brown, and blue,
And, when he was not bald, his hair was of chameleon hue;
Lean, fat, tall, short, rich, poor, grave, gay, a blonde and a brunette--
Aha, amid this London fog, John Smith, I see you yet;
I see you yet, and yet the sight is all so blurred I seem
To see you in composite, or as in a waking dream,
Which are you, John? I'd like to know, that I might weave a rhyme
Appropriate to your character, your politics and clime;
So tell me, were you 'raised' or 'reared'--your pedigree confess
In some such treacherous ism as 'I reckon' or 'I guess';
Let fall your tell-tale dialect, that instantly I may
Identify my countryman, 'John Smith, U.S.A.'
It's like as not you are the John that lived a spell ago
Down East, where codfish, beans 'nd bona-fide school-marms grow;
Where the dear old homestead nestles like among the Hampshire hills
And where the robin hops about the cherry boughs and trills;
Where Hubbard squash 'nd huckleberries grow to powerful size,
And everything is orthodox from preachers down to pies;
Where the red-wing blackbirds swing 'nd call beside the pickril pond,
And the crows air cawin' in the pines uv the pasture lot beyond;
Where folks complain uv bein' poor, because their money's lent
Out West on farms 'nd railroads at the rate uv ten per cent;
Where we ust to spark the Baker girls a-comin' home from choir,
Or a-settin' namin' apples round the roarin' kitchen fire:
Where we had to go to meetin' at least three times a week,
And our mothers learnt us good religious Dr. Watts to speak,
And where our grandmas sleep their sleep--God rest their souls, I say!
And God bless yours, ef you're that John, 'John Smith, U.S.A.'
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poem by Eugene Field
Added by Poetry Lover
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