Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE OLD-TIME FAMILY, by EDGAR ALBERT GUEST


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE OLD-TIME FAMILY, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: It makes me smile to hear 'em tell each other
Last Line: I never heard my father or my mother wish for less.
Alternate Author Name(s): Guest, Eddie
Subject(s): Family Life; Relatives


It makes me smile to hear 'em tell each other nowadays
The burdens they are bearing, with a child or two to raise.
Of course the cost of living has gone soaring to the sky
And our kids are wearing garments that my parents couldn't buy.
Now my father wasn't wealthy, but I never heard him squeal
Because eight of us were sitting at the table every meal.

People fancy they are martyrs if their children number three,
And four or five they reckon makes a large-sized family.
A dozen hungry youngsters at a table I have seen
And their daddy didn't grumble when they licked the platter clean.
Oh, I wonder how these mothers and these fathers up-to-date
Would like the job of buying little shoes for seven or eight.

We were eight around the table in those happy days back them,
Eight that cleaned our plates of pot-pie and then passed
them up again;
Eight that needed shoes and stockings, eight to wash and put to bed,
And with mighty little money in the purse, as I have said,
But with all the care we brought them, and through all the
days of stress,
I never heard my father or my mother wish for less.





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