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Title: Ballade Of The Breakfast Table
Author: Franklin P. Adams [
More Titles by Adams]
When the Festal Board, as the papers say,
Groans 'neath the weight of a lot to eat,
At breakfast, Fruhstuck or dejeuner,
(As a bard tri-lingual I'm rather neat)
At breakfast, then, if I may repeat,
This is what gets me into a huff,
This is a query I cannot beat:
Why don't they ever have spoons enough?
I've broken my fast with the grave and gay,
With hoi polloi and with the elite;
I've been all over the U. S. A.
From Dorchester Crossing to Kearney Street.
But aye when I sit in the morning seat
Comes to my notice the self-same bluff,
Plenty of food, but in this they cheat:
Why don't they ever have spoons enough?
Take it at breakfast, only to-day:
This was the layout, fresh and sweet:
Canteloupe, sweet as the new-mown hay;[1]
Cereal--one of the brands [2] of wheat;
Soft--boiled eggs (we've cut out the meat);
Coffee (a claro--manila--buff);
Napery, china, and glasses complete--
Why don't they ever have spoons enough?
L'ENVOI
Autocratesses, forgive my heat,
But isn't it time to change that stuff?
Small is the benison I entreat--
Why don't they ever have spoons enough?
[Footnote 1: And about as edible.]
[Footnote 2: To advertisers: This space for sale.]
[The end]
Franklin P. Adams's poem: Ballade Of The Breakfast Table
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