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Title: Hezekiah's Art
Author: Joseph Crosby Lincoln [
More Titles by Lincoln]
My son Hezekiah's a painter; yes, that's the purfession he's at;
An artist, I mean,--course he ain't a whitewasher or nothin' like that.
At home he was always a-drawin' and shirkin' his work 'round the place,
And kept me continyerly jawin' or dressin' him down with a trace;
Till I says ter Mother, "Between us, this thing might's well be understood;
Our Hez is jest simply a gen'us, and a gen'us is _never_ no good;
He won't stop fer jawin's and dressin's; he'll daub and he'll draw all the while;
So he might as well have a few lessons, and learn how ter do it in style."
So I sold a slice of the wood-lot ter the folks at the summer hotel,
That fetched me some cash--quite a good lot--so now he's been gone a long spell;
He's got a room up ter the City, an' calls it a name that is queer--
I ain't up in French, more's the pity--but something that's like "attyleer."
I went up last month on a visit, and blamed if that place wa'n't a sight!
The fourteenth or fifteenth--which is it?--well, anyhow, it's the top flight;
I wouldn't have b'lieved he could be there, way up on that breath-takin' floor,
If't wa'n't fer the sign that I see there--"H. Lafayette Boggs"--on the door.
That room was a wonder fer certain! The floor was all paint-spots and dirt,
Each window was hung with a curtain, striped gay as a calico shirt;
The walls was jest like a museum, all statoos and flim-flam and gush
And picters--good land! when I see 'em I jest had ter turn 'round and blush;
And Hez! he looked like a gorilla,--a leetle round hat on his head,
And hair that would stuff a big piller, and necktie blue, yeller, and red;
I swan, he did look like a daisy! I tell yer, it went ter my heart,
'Cause, course I supposed he was crazy, until he explained it was ART.
This Art, it does stagger a feller that ain't got a connerseer's view,
Fer trees by its teachin' is yeller, and cows is a shade of sky-blue.
Hez says that ter paint 'em like natur' is common and tawdry and vile;
He says it's a plaguey sight greater to do 'em "impressionist style."
He done me my portrait, and, reely, my nose is a ultrymarine,
My whiskers is purple and steely, and both of my cheeks is light green.
When Mother first viewed it she fainted--she ain't up in Art, don't yer see?
And she had a notion 'twas painted when Hez had been off on a spree.
We used ter think Hezzy would shame us by bein' no good anyhow,
But he says some day he'l be famous, so we're sort er proud of him, now.
He says that the name he's a-makin' shall ring in Fame's thunderin' tone;
He says that earth's dross he's forsaken, he's livin' fer Art's sake alone.
That's nice, but what seems ter me funny, and what I can't get through my head
Is why he keeps writin' fer money and can't seem ter earn nary red.
I've been sort er thinkin' it over, and seems ter me, certain enough,
That livin' _for_ Art is just clover, but that livin' _on_ it is tough.
[The end]
Joseph Crosby Lincoln's poem: Hezekiah's Art
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