Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WHAT PUZZLES ME, by BURGES JOHNSON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WHAT PUZZLES ME, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: There's something I'm awfully anxious to know
Last Line: That you is you, an' me is me.
Subject(s): Children; Curiosities & Wonders; Fate; Mothers & Sons; Childhood; Enigmas; Oddities; Destiny


There's something I'm awfully anxious to know,
I think it's important as it can be—
S'pose it had happened beforehand so
That I was somebody else but me?
Then some other boy would be your little boy,
An' love you more than a tongue-can-tell;
I wonder would he be his mother's-joy,
An' smooth her headaches to make them well?
—'Cause I think it's funny as it can be,
That you is you, an' me is me.

I've worried and bothered for most a day,
'Termining what I should ever do,
If things were arranged in a different way,
An' you should be somebody else but you.
You'd live in some other place but here—
Far away, maybe—but anyhow,
I'm perfectly positive, Mother dear,
I'd love you 'zactly as much as now.
—But I think it's funny as it can be,
That you is you, an' me is me.

If you was somebody else but you,
P'r'aps we'd meet in the street some day,
An' I'd be p'lite an' say "Howdedo!"
An' "What a nice little boy!" you'd say.
Then we'd walk for almost a block, before
I'd tell you just who I was—an' then—
You wouldn't be somebody else anymore,
An' I'd be your little boy again.
—An' I think it's funny as it can be,
That you is you, an' me is me.





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