Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WHAT CONSTITUTES A 'TEAM' IN VERMONT, by DANIEL LEAVENS CADY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WHAT CONSTITUTES A 'TEAM' IN VERMONT, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Life flows quite smoothly through our house
Last Line: "as ride around in half a ""team."
Subject(s): Animals; Horses; Vermont


LIFE flows quite smoothly through our house,
The weeks and week-ends gently meet;
We both like olives, samp and souse,
We're neither keen for Injun wheat;
There's jest one flaw that mars the ring,
One wakeful place in life's sweet dream—
My wife maintains, up hill and down,
A one-horse rig is not a "team."

You see my lady's native state
Is laved by Mississippi's tide;
There wonders happen while you wait,
There roads are level, long and wide;
A land where four-horse turnouts speed,
Where plows and harrows go by steam,
And 'tisn't strange she doesn't call
A little one-horse rig a "team."

A red-wheeled hitch-up oft goes past
Our house and stains the winder panes;
The harness gleams, the horse steps fast,
The driver leans against the reins;
I always watch that glittering rig—
It's what the boys would call "a scream"—
I also always hear these words,
"I s'pose he thinks he's got a 'team'."

And when I say in accents fine—
"It 'pears to my Vermontish mind
A man is in the teaming line
Who drives a horse and sets behind,"
I get this answer, "No; my dear,
It wouldn't be no more extreme
To say the boy who rides one mule
Or leads one donkey has a 'team.'"

It's sure a subject nice and new—
A "case" for any arguing man—
One horse, of course, is less than two,
If one's a team, then what's a span?
I don't give in, though I admit
How well my wife pursues her theme;
But, Shucks! I'd jest as lives a-walk
As ride around in half a "team."





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